The World at Large
by carpelibris
Summary: Mildly AU Post-S3 piece. Rae cuts her ties with the gang and leaves Stamford for Bristol University. She begins to start a life for herself with new people and opportunities when an invitation home makes her reconsider her choices.
1. Chapter 1

_Dear Diary,_

 _It's been exactly two solid weeks since I got here. Where do I start? There's been a lot going on and I've had exactly zero time to write anything that isn't on a dotted line. Train journey wasn't too bad, bit boring. I ran out of batteries for my Walkman about halfway through. Typical. I had about an hour and a half of counting the lines in the seat pattern out of sheer boredom and finding the registration building was like a where's Wally page crossed with an It's a Knockout marathon with lugging my suitcase about. But I did it. I managed. I haven't had time to stop since I got here. My stuff is still sitting in the case on the bed. All in all it's not good, not bad. Just different._

 _I think I need different._

The first night somewhere new was always going to be the hardest. It had been a long day, a stressful day, but she'd done it and for that she was almost proud. After waiting in queue after queue to register for classes, pick up her student card and sort out accommodation she finally had a set of keys in her hand. The weight of them felt reassuring despite her exhaustion as she rolled her suitcase to the building that would be hers for the next few years. A flight of stairs later and she was face to face with her new flat and whoever would be waiting on the other side.

Rae slid the key into the lock and gently opened the door letting it close behind her suitcase with a thunk. She found her room easily enough. There were only four bedrooms all across from each other with a kitchen, bathroom and living room between them on opposite sides of the hallway. Two of the doors were closed and she could hear muffled music from behind one of them. The third was open and she could hear someone moving boxes along the carpet and shifting things about.

When she opened the door to her own room she was greeted by pine, lots and lots of pine. It was like a flat pack nightmare. It was also a bit sparse. A small wardrobe hid behind the door, a bedside table sat to the right of her new bed and a desk stood forlornly on the opposite wall. The cold blue walls and matching blind reminded her of dentist waiting rooms a little, but it was hers.

By the time the evening rolled in she'd done a bit of manoeuvring with the furniture and it started to look more like a bedroom. Her desk took pride of place opposite her bed and by the window. There were a plethora of posters and photos dotted along her room walls. Even the cheap set of fairy lights she brought actually managed to make even the pale walls seem cheery. The corner where she has her music was still a bit bare, but when the rest of her things arrived she could almost feel at home. Once she'd 'sprayed Rae all over it'. It was safe in the bubble she'd built. It starts to feel familiar, a comfort, but at some point she knew she had to step out into the world outside of her desk.

It would be a lie to say there hadn't been tears, she expected them. Just not the achy feeling that settled in her chest long after they'd stopped. Maybe she should have waited a few more days to put the photos up,but the smiling faces that had hurt to look at at first after the second bout of tearfulness they became something of a comfort. After a short time gravity seemed to work overtime and the bed welcomed her with open arms for a few blissful hours. She was only woken up by the noise of her housemates wandering about and the sound of a TV blaring.

Her suitcase was still unpacked, the clothes all neatly folded until she dug around in it for a change of jumper. Her hand was wrapped around the door handle for a few moments before she ventured out into the now dark hallway. The only light was from the main living room as she headed closer.

'Some of us are going round for a pizza.' She looked round to see a boy about her age poking his head out from the living room. The hallway between them was still dim but she could make out his dark hair and eyes covered by some slightly overgrown hair at the front from the glow of the light inside the room.

'Oh, right,' she hadn't thought about dinner and suddenly the thought of it brought on her appetite. He leaned against the doorframe for a moment before stepping back into the room, his grey marl t-shirt being the last thing to disappear from sight. She'd have to sort something herself once they were done. She dithered between the doorframe and the hall, almost turning back to her room to leave them to it.

'What do you want?' He moved back out to the hall and gestured with an incline of his head to the post-it notes on the coffee table and she felt a small surge of gratitude.

'Oh, erm just a plain cheese please.'

He gave a slight nod without looking up and went back to the table and wrote it down. 'Right, one Ham and Pineapple and two Margaritas.' He double checked with the rest of the floor and moved to collect his wallet and shrugged his jacket on. He was out the door with the other boy before she got back from her room to get her purse or even say thanks. She padded into the room and perched herself on the edge of the arm of a chair.

'He'll sort it when he gets back.' Rae turned her head towards the sitting area where another girl was sprawled out across the couch. Her pale brown hair spilled out over the side as she pulled down on the sleeves of her sweatshirt to get comfy. She gave Rae a warm smile and picked up the remote to change the TV to a Friends repeat.

'A few of us got here a few days ago' she continued. 'Place was deserted. I'm Sam' she gave a little wave of greeting and Rae took a seat on the opposite sofa.

'Rae.'

The murmur of the TV stayed on and it fell into a quietness with the occasional canned laughter from the audience. Not an awkward or heavy quiet, just enough to let her settle.

'You from here or?' Sam broke the silence again and Rae shifted to sit down in the chair.

'No, I moved down from Stamford.'

'Cardiff, I had a mate who moved round your bit I think. The other two are from Liverpool and Manchester.'

Rae listened as she talked and filled her in a bit on what she was studying and bits and pieces about home. She couldn't talk too much about it yet but Sam talked enough for the both of them and mentioned a few places to go for Freshers week, inviting her out with her when the subject changed again and she was caught momentarily off guard.

'You ever read any James Joyce?'

'Don't think so, is his stuff any good?'

'Christ no, I got forced to read bits of one of his books in school. Right boring fucker,' she ran a hand through her hair and laughed. 'If it comes up in one of your classes I can save you the bother of reading it.'

'Thanks,' she said with a grateful smile. 'suppose I'll find out this week if he's on it. What about you?' she broached, 'are you doing English lit or?'

'Nah, thought about it. Sociology. Thought it'd piss off my parents more. Quite like it though.'

They chatted back and forwards for a while before there was a clatter at the door and the two boys struggled in with pizza boxes and some plastic bags filled with clinking bottles and snacks.

'Telling you mate they should do classes on his stuff. Man gets nowhere near enough recognition.' The boy with pale dishevelled curls and a pair of sunglasses and a black blazer prattled on as he held open the door for the other and got a non-committal grunt from his companion in return. He took his share of the bags and boxes and put them upon the kitchen counter behind them and the two girls moved to join them as they unpacked.

'Seeing as they're not going to bother, this' Sam pointed at the dark haired boy from before, 'is Ewan, and that one,' she looked over at the other blonde boy, 'is Rob-'

'Bob,' he cut in.

'Right, Bob,' she rolled her eyes and started ripping the tops of the pizza boxes into squares for plates while Ewan dished out the slices for everybody silently. Offering a few grunts in response to the odd question.

After a few hours of chatting and clearing up, or in Ewan's case silent nods they found that they seemed to get along kind of well. The night faded in and things fell quiet again all but for the sound of some Japanese game show in the background that Sam and Rob-Bob seemed to love. There was still that uneasiness there. It was all still new and she knew that it would take time for them all to get used to each other. It wasn't home, but in time maybe it could be.

It was a start.


	2. Chapter 2

_Dear Diary,_

 _Can I just start off by saying that Middlemarch is the most painfully dull book I've ever forced my eyes to read through. It's about eight hundred pages of boring people making awful decisions and being horrible to each other. All my notes on it are sarky comments, and I can't be bothered to finish it. The cover keeps glaring at me from the desk, it's mocking me now. No way am I finishing it. Just hope it doesn't come up in the exam. Had a bad day a few days not even be worth mentioning. One of the girls from 20th Century Lit class liked one of my t-shirts and she mentioned how they never did girl's sizes and how it must be good that I don't have to worry about stuff like that. Do I still feel like shit? Yes. Will I get over it? Probably._

For a Monday morning seminar her lecturer was surprisingly energetic. She still wanted to crawl back to her bed to attempt to make up the weekend's lack of sleep. The floor above her room was constantly thumping which made sleep impossible. Not even the couch through in the other room with her headphones at full blast was enough to escape the noise, but she attempted to listen in for the most part.

* * *

'Right, now this,' she tuned in in time as he held up his old water stained and battered looking copy of this week's book up, 'is what your texts should look like by the end of the year. Batter them about, fold the pages, scribble in the margins.' He was younger than she'd assumed he would be. She was expecting same dusty blokes from that disaster of an interview with a mandatory pole shoved somewhere the sun doesn't shine, but he was the opposite. He used his first name, Mark, for a start. He had this thick Brummie accent and a way of speaking that made his seminars sound almost informal. She zoned out for a while and when she looked back he'd taken the book again and pressed down hard on the spine in the middle so it laid out flat. Some of the pages fell loose earning him a few murmurs of disapproval from the rows around her.

'That's what I want you to start doing. That's your main task for the next week and I'll be looking for it in the tutorials. I want you to start writing in them. If you found a bit of it interesting or you hated it just write something down. It'll make all the essay writing I'll be dishing out easier. No point keeping your books perfect, the most well-loved are the ones that've been through the wars.'

It all sounded a bit preachy to her. She doubted he'd ever had to sell any of his on second hand to pay for next year's set. Not everybody had a bottomless cash pile, but if she wrote in pencil she might just be alright. The lecture ended with the usual tutorial questions to fill out and talk over later on and a reminder that the first essay deadline was looming. One of the benefits of arriving late was that she managed to get out a bit quicker before everybody else had filled out and crowded the halls.

She came home to find Ewan hunched over the coffee table where he was sat on the floor with stacks of CDs and timesheets strewn around him. He didn't look up at her hello or acknowledge her existence when she lurched her tired legs over to sit on the couch. He ran the student radio station down at the union most days with some of his mates. Seemed like a bit of a boys club during Freshers week sign-ups, much to her annoyance or she'd have maybe taken more of an interest. In the back of her mind she already had playlists and call-in discussions mapped out for her own show. She just didn't quite have the guts. Maybe it was some consolation that she got to give some input when he asked for everybody's opinions once in a blue moon, or not.

Rae decided to use the near emptiness of the flat to use the phone. It only took two rings for her to pick up and the familiar voice on the other end instantly brightened her spirits. She'd missed their chats.

'Hello?' Chloe's tired voice brought a second of guilt. Maybe she should have rang her at the weekend instead.

'Sorry, it's just me. If it's a bad time I can ring you later.'

'Rae?' Her voice perked up and Rae found herself smiling.

'Hiya.'

'Everything alright babe?'

'Yeah, just fancied a chat. What you up to?' Rae twirled the cord between her fingers absently as she listened.

'I'd say I was studying, but the pack of highlighters I've just wasted say otherwise.'

'I'm not any better, I can't face reading the rest of this thing,' she fanned the pages of the book beside her for emphasis even though Chloe couldn't actually see what she was doing. 'That bad?'

'You've no idea Rae. There's this class on business law or something like that. You should see the size of the textbook they've made us cart about. I'm going to end up with arms like pop-eye by the end of this. If I even stick it out.'

'What d'you mean?'

'I dunno,' her voice got quiet and for a moment Rae wondered if she'd hung up. 'I don't really know what I'm doing. I was talking with some of the girls and everybody else has ideas about what they're applying to after this and I haven't got a clue. You know I'm only here because my dad knows the guy that runs the place.'

'Your dad didn't take your exams for you though. That was all you.'

'Yeah, but-'

'But nothing, you did all the work to get in. You deserve to be there just as much as the rest of them chlo, right?'

'Yeah, I just wish I felt more sure about this stuff.'

'I don't think any of us are.' Rae heard Chloe quietly sigh on the other end before she changed the subject.

'You still up for me visiting later? I've got two presentations and a mock report to write before the end of term, but I can deffo meet up after that.'

'Course, you know I'd love that. I'll give you a ring in a couple of weeks to sort it. Yeah?'

'Yeah, seven's probably a better time. Shaz is out with her boyfriend by then usually so we can chat properly.'

'Ok, I'll ring you again then. Love you.'

'Love you too babe.' She hung up the phone and put it back on the receiver and shuffled her feet towards her bedroom for some much needed sleep.

When she got up in the middle of the night to get a glass of water Ewan was right where she'd seen him last. The only difference was that his jacket was tossed behind him now and the sleeves of his shirt were pulled up at the elbows. His dark hair was rumpled from hands constantly running through it, but he was as still and quiet as usual. Rae took a glass out from the cupboard as silently as she could manage and ran it under the tap. Rae heard him huff and put a hand to the side of his forehead in frustration.

'Can I take a look?' She asked. He mumbled something in her direction which she took as an ok and moved herself to the table and lifted up one of the sheets to see the song list he'd discarded. 'This for tonight?'

'Friday, Mike pissed off on us and we've got to make up his time slot till somebody new takes over. Pain in the arse.' That last sentence was said in a surprising amount of venom considering his usual disinterested demeanour. He must've been stressed, it was the most she'd heard him say in one go for a while. Rae examined the tracks and couldn't find too much fault, maybe a bit less chart stuff but it looked fine. Good even. She winced as the pen in his hand scratched out line after line. His face didn't show it but he was definitely agitated.

'I'll leave you to it then.'

'What about this?' He looked over at her and passed the sheet he'd scored out and she took it with some trepidation. Weren't musicians supposed to be intense and vulnerable to criticism? she wondered if radio presenters were the same.

'You could switch this one for 'Female of the Species' and go from there. It's a bit upbeat. That's how most concerts and that go. Start off with the big energy stuff, get everybody going then slow it down to the slower bits till they come back with the upbeat tracks at the end. Works for them and I make playlists a lot like that, the people I've sent them down to haven't complained so there's that.'

'Sounds ok,' it was so quiet she almost missed it. 'We've got to play those ones,' he pointed to some top forty tracks dotted around the page. 'The union gets money or something when they air them, but we've got control for the rest. It's a crap setup but it's better than nothing.'

Music was still very much her territory and she quickly immersed herself in rummaging through songs from the list and suggesting bits and pieces. They argued, if you could call it arguing. It was mostly her stating facts with the occasional glare shot her way from him when he disagreed about things like who was a better base player versus lyricist. Her opinion on Marr wasn't shifting, no matter what he said to the opposite. They must have sat there for hours. The rattling of keys brought her out of her music haze and she realised it was the back of one in the morning at the least. Bob stumbled in past them and straight for the bathroom where he didn't emerge again until he looked a shade of green as he slinked off to his room. She took this as a sign to call it quits or she'd wake up feeling like she'd spent the night in a tumble dryer during the spin cycle.

'I better head off, you going to be alright here?' He didn't say anything and it was as if by the stroke of midnight he'd transformed back into a mime artist and shrugged at her.

'I'll take that as a yeah,' she murmured getting up. Her legs felt stiff from where she'd been sitting for hours. The soft mattress in the great beyond of her room was like a siren call to her. One she gave into willingly as she closed her door over to get changed and salvage a normal night's sleep in five hours.

There was a hesitant knock at the door not long after her head hit the pillows. Part of her wanted to ignore it. If it was important they'd let her know in the morning, but for some stupid reason her brain decided to ignore her body's pleading and get up. She crawled out from the covers and padded to open the door. Ewan hovered in the hallway, still in the same creased clothes from earlier.

'What're you doing Friday night?'

'No idea, why?' At this point she was willing to agree to anything to get some sleep. She could feel her eyes start to itch.

'Nothing.' He scratched at the top of his arm and went to let her go but doubled back in two bounds to face her again, 'well actually, do you think you could give me a hand down at the union? Need somebody to watch the timeslots and I'd ask Chris but he's as useful as a condom made of chewing gum.'

'Er, yeah. I can give it a go.' Her mouth formed the words before her brain caught up and she realised what she'd agreed to. Her mind was already showcasing all the possible scenarios of it going tits up. Too late to take it back. _Oh bollocks_.

'Cheers.' He smiled, an actual smile. He really must've been knackered. She wished she had a camera to show the rest of them but he'd already slunk off back to the living room where as far as she knew he didn't leave till she got up for class the next morning.


	3. Chapter 3

_Dear Diary,_

 _Number of nights out: 3_

 _Number of take-aways: 5_

 _Number of Essays due: 2_

 _I Really need to get my arse in gear. I've got my first essay in two weeks and my brain refuses to get past the first paragraph. I feel like I get it. I get what they're trying to say. I love the way the words all just come together and I've got all these ideas in the back of my head, but what if what I have to say is wrong? What if I've got the whole point of the poem wrong? Ewan hasn't said anything about helping him so I think I've got out of it. I don't think I could listen to Aqua's latest with a straight face._

The kitchen looked like the scene from a crime novel. Tomato sauce splattered over the counter and the cooker in arcs of bright red. More of it was on the surfaces than in the pot on the oven where something simmered and hissed under a lid on the hob. The two of them milled about the kitchen collecting things from the fridge and generally making a mess while Rae sat behind them on the couch with her copy of Twentieth Century poems, trying and failing to give it her full attention from the din behind her head.

'You sure it's meant to look like that?' Bob peered over his shoulder at the cooker top in curiosity while he reached up into the cupboard for plates.

'I swear to god, if you ask me that one more time-I know what I' doing, out the way.' Sam nudged Bob out of the way with her hip and took the strainer out of the drawer below him to drain the water from the meatballs.

'I don't think there's meant to be those-'

'Right, Bob Dylan is a middle-class hippie pretender riding on traditional folk culture and-'

'Alright, alright. No need to get personal now,' Bob held his hands up in mock defense and opened a can of coke as Sam struggled with what Rae assumed was supposed to be spaghetti.

'Off, off, come on,' Sam shook the pot and scraped at the bottom of it with a fork.

'The hell is that?' Ewan had snuck behind them to the fridge and crouched to get a beer. He eyed the meatballs with a mixture of curiosity and disgust. 'If you poke it looks like it'll moo.'

'Smell it, it's fine, smell.' Sam thrusted the spoon at him and he dodged backwards a few times as she lunged it at him. He continued to avoid her aim with a repeated muttering of refusals. She ended up close to chasing him round the flat to prove the point. 'Sniff it. Smell that meat.' Even without context it still wasn't the weirdest thing she'd heard anybody shout. She'd had eighteen years with her mum. She gave up and put the book down to watch the scene unfold over her shoulder.

'I don't need to, I believe you. Right? I believe you.' Ewan held up his hands in surrender, looking to the others for help. Rae raised her eyebrows and pretended to turn back to her book, staying out of it. Once the three of them were seated around the coffee table and the knives and forks were laid out Sam came towards them with a large bowl and a set of tongs and plunked it between them and took a seat on the floor beside them.

'We're going attempt to conform to societal norms. We're going to have an adult meal, right?' She lifted the lid and a puff of steam rose into the air and they saw what was supposed to be their meal for the night.

'Right, yeah. Whatever.' Ewan took the tongs first and tried not to make a face as he eyed the contents of his plate. Rae followed and passed the tongs to Bob and then Sam. When she looked down at her plate her face dropped. Everything was burnt within an inch of its life. The pasta stuck together in congealed clumps where the lumpy red sauce hadn't reached it topped with the grey meatballs she couldn't actually cut into without effort.

'So?' Sam looked to them expectantly when none of them dared lift a fork.

'It's erm,' Rae searched for an answer as she lifted a piece to her mouth and took a bite. It felt like it was some sort of weird punishment her mum might have come up with. Like something they serve in prisons. She was still trying to chew it but it felt like rubber in her mouth. Spitting it out onto her napkin would be obvious and rude so she swallowed it down with eye-watering effort and pushed the burnt pasta around on her plate. The other two were silently struggling and she hadn't seen either of them take a second bite.

'S'nice,' Ewan's mouth was still full. His face almost looked in pain as he gave a feeble thumbs up.

'You what?'

'I said,' he swallowed with effort. 'It's nice. The black bits give it a kick.' He spluttered through a second bite and reached for his beer to drown out the taste.

Sam him a glare with the fork hovering at her mouth. She took a bite while they were all quietly shuffling the spaghetti around the plate to look like they'd eaten when Rae saw that Sam was still chewing and spat it out onto her plate with a grimace.

'Christ,' she spat, 'that is rank. Sorry,' she wiped at her mouth with some kitchen towel. 'Jesus.'

Rae was the first to laugh followed by Sam and even Ewan smirked down at his plate.

'It's not that bad it's really em,' Bob spoke mid mouthful and held up one of the meatballs with his fork. 'Is it meant to be as grey as that?'

'Why are you still eating it you div? You could fix a tyre with it. Give.' Sam took the plates away, taking the last one while the fork was still in Bob's hand.

'Stick with cheese on toast next time then?'

The agreement was unanimous. It took multiple refills of their drinks to wash the taste out while they rooted around for the take away menus when Sam's eyes went wide and she darted to the oven door.

'Oh fuck,' she opened the door out and a waft of grey smoke flew out from whatever she'd cremated in there. She fanned at the smoke with a towel and within seconds the smoke alarm triggered. Ewan pulled himself in a lithe motion from the floor and went to open the window out.

'Shit, turn it off, quick.' Sam danced from side to side like a toddler about to pee themselves while Rae went to check nobody had noticed.

'Can't reach,' Bob batted at the top of the white plastic case, 'it's screwed on.'

Rae peered out of the front door to see people further down getting knocks on their door and turned back inside. 'Oh bollocks, people are getting cleared out of their rooms.' Rae closed the door back over so it was ajar and a minute later someone was at the door telling them to evacuate to the gardens at the back.

'That's it, you're banned from anywhere near there.' Ewan gestured to the kitchen and Sam opened her mouth to speak where he cut her off. 'Banned.'

The four of them filed out the door and down the stairs with the others left in the building and outside where they tried to avoid catching eyes with anyone.

'Least we'll get to see some Firemen,' Sam gave a sheepish grimace.

The entire building were sat out on the grass for what felt like the whole night by the time the fire crew had arrived, checked every floor and come back outside. One of them held something in his hand that Rae couldn't quite see while he spoke with the resident manager. She saw him point their way and amble his way across the grass towards them.

'Might want to leave it at pot noodle next time folks.' He pursed his lips at Sam who still had the incriminating bolognaise sauce scattered through her hair and top and handed her the blackened pan.

'Fuck,' Sam hissed. She looked down at the blackened pan with pursed lips and let it fall to her side in mock defeat. 'This is an omen, we're clearly not cut out for this responsibility lark. We're clearly doomed.'

'Speak for yourself,' Ewan muttered incredulously till they were back to laughing again.


	4. Chapter 4

_Dear Diary,_

 _NEVER agree to do anything when you're tired. The radio thing is back on. He mentioned it this morning before I left and I didn't give him a straight answer, but he seems to think I'm up for it. I'm officially bricking it. It's already Wednesday night and I've finished one essay and got three quarters of another left for next week. I don't have time. Well, that's bollocks, I do, I just don't want to. What does he even want me to do? I'll end up erasing the whole thing or setting the place on fire pushing the wrong button or something_.

In the two months that had passed since she'd had her first classes she started to wonder why she had ever been so scared of being there. It was so different than school or even college. Wildly different. The people around her wanted to be there. There was nobody who was there just because there was nothing else to do or because they were made to. They all chose to be there, and it changed everything.

People actually heard what she had to say. They listened and sometimes agreed with her. Even when she talked about the things she'd read and the thoughts she usually stifled out of fear of being ridiculed for so much as daring to breathe before. It was so different.

She had days and days spent in the library pouring over page after page of all these amazing writers and their voices preserved in the paper. She read her way through stacks of titles analysing these people, some of them wandering around the world with similar thoughts and ideas that crossed her own mind, and some that never occurred to her at all. All these voices and eye-opening perspectives there for the taking. It was a lot.

Of course there were still things like oral presentations that made her chest burn and her hands sting, and of course it was hard when not everybody understood her attempts at humour when she felt nervous about what she was saying, but it was always over as quick as it began. Things moved on and it didn't matter if she stumbled over her words or forgot her train of thought. When she looked around her everybody else seemed to struggle much the same. Most people were too busy with themselves. That was actually a comfort. Nobody was looking at her when they were too preoccupied over being next to get up in front of all those eyes to talk. It took some of the pressure of in those first few weeks, especially where her classmates sometimes disagreed, that just started debates with the class. She listened, taking it all in. When she felt the scratchiness creeping in it just drove her to speak. It might not always have worked, but she was trying, really trying. Chloe was a phone call away and she could distract herself sometimes making herself remember stupid things like trying to remember the order of the top forty or picturing the steps of making toast. Things that grounded her thoughts a bit. It wasn't perfect, Not at all, but it counted and that was enough. She was enough.

At the end of her last tutorial for the week her tutor passed the essays from last month back. She watched as those around her flipped through their papers with either a smile or in a few cases a look of dejection when the paper with her familiar handwriting slid to her desk. Rae looked down at the number at the top right of the page. It was a lot higher than she'd expected to see, it was a lot higher than a lot of people if the chatter of people around her swapping marks was anything to go by. She knew she could write a decent essay with minimal effort and still get a good mark back in college where it didn't matter as much, but a university essay was massively different. It felt huge.

It felt like approval.

By the time Friday rolled by she nearly forgot about Ewan's radio show from the flurry of deadlines and lectures. When she got outside the building she saw him in his green utility jacket and faded jeans, the soft black hair of his fringe sweeping over across his eyes in the wind. He was crossing over the pathway towards her with his bag sliding off of his slim framed shoulders till he shifted the weight back over, righting himself. He gave her a silent nod of greeting as he fell into pace with her walk.

'Rae,' he gestured with his shoulder over the other side of the street. 'Rae, it's this way,' he pushed his bag onto his shoulders again and made sure she was following him before he turned his head to face the front as they walked.

They moved through the part of the Union bar usually reserved for nights out when everybody was skint again or all the other places in the city were looking full. It felt weird seeing it empty, like a dog walking on its back legs. Like she was somewhere she wasn't meant to be as they passed it and moved through to the stairs to get to the studio on the top floor.

When she stepped through the doors after him she gripped the strap of her backpack and followed him through to the cloakroom where she ditched her jacket and followed him through to the studio doors. He sat down on the left side of one of two small booth rooms adjoining each other with a large clear glass panel between them. On either side were identical desks kitted out with soundboards, screens, headphones, faders and mics all wired up through each other. Just looking at it was what she imagined manning a flight control desk must feel like. It was all a plethora of buttons and flashing orange and red lights across the boards.

'Remind me that I owe you after this, there's coke and water in the fridge over there if you want anything.' He pointed just behind her to a mini fridge plugged in awkwardly with the plug wire stretched about as far as it would go. 'Make yourself comfy. I'll be back in a bit.' He left the room and came back with a magazine and a stack of timesheets.

'What do you want me to do then?' Rae faced the buttons with a look of mild bewilderment.

'I can't control both the faders and everything else. Mike used to do most of this stuff. It's mostly just making sure everything starts when it's supposed to in there,' Ewan pointed across to the other room. 'I'll tell you when to push things. You can probably get whatever reading you've got done in-between if you want.'

'Okay,' she still wasn't all that sure but if something went wrong he wasn't likely to have a go at her when she hadn't asked to be there in the first place. He talked her through most of it and in fairness it wasn't too difficult. Most things were labelled and it was really just a case of pushing things in time and paying attention when things were live.

'All you need to do when this button flashes is press the one above it here,' he hovered his finger over it to show her and continued to mess about with the sliders.

'So when's your slot?'

'Don't have one,' he shook his head at the idea. 'Production's more my thing. I like messing about with the sound and the formatting. Good practice if I get in with a production team, if I get to edit.' She forgot he was doing media studies, he seemed to have the least free time but as far as she knew he didn't have as many essays or reading. It must have been things like this.

'Right, think that's it. Just need to wait for Chris to show his face.'

About five minutes later there was a clattering outside where they could see who she assumed was Chris knock over the coat stand in his hurry. He was wiry shape, long slim arms and legs on a very thin frame. His pale blond hair was styled cropped close at the side with that curtained fringe look she'd seen on one of those boyband posters the other year. He came into the desk opposite them and pulled on his headphones. Rae started the countdown once he'd given the thumbs up. Immediately following her silent countdown down from five to one his whole demeanour changed and his face broke out into a grin as he crooned into the mic.

'Evening, if you've just tuned in you're in luck 'cause we're switching things up tonight with some of The Doors, here is Hello I love you.'

Rae moved the slider and the song began to play and winded it down towards the end. Chris continued to talk freely into the mic in a tone that reminded her of breakfast TV hosts, that sort of forced cheerfulness, but he was good. No denying that; just a bit naff. The third seventies prog rock track settled it in her mind. She listened in as the tracks played out between his talks and every now and again she'd have a cue from Ewan to switch tracks or fade the sound down at the end to the ad breaks.

She watched him bounce about every now and again, making sure he was never too far from the mic which earned him a warning wave from Ewan and he'd reel it in. Rae watched the show play out and slided the button when prompted every now and again and found herself getting used to the boards. After a while she could do it without really looking and started to scribble and write down a list of songs developing in her head.

'What you doing?' Ewan leaned closer to her to look, probably getting a bit bored like she was.

'Hmm?' When she saw where he was looking she shrugged her shoulders, trying to look not un-phased. 'Just messing about,'

'Can I see?'

'If you want, I was just a bit bored,' He pulled the paper towards him and made sounds of agreement when he was interrupted.

'How's it sounding then?' Dan had pulled off his headphones and pressed the intercom button down from the other room and looked up at them questionably. Ewan pressed their own down and leaned into the mic to speak.

'Good, need to tweak some of the fade-ins but we're more or less sorted.'

'Crackin' I'm going he head off, still need to be here for seven?'

'Seven, half-six is better but if you can get in the room for seven,' Ewan agreed and stayed where he sat as Dan got up to go. He peeked his head through their door a moment later and her eyes caught with his.

'You staying on or did you manage to get somebody to take over yet?' Rae wasn't sure who he was talking to but Ewan answered first.

'Working on it, I'll talk tomorrow.' Ewan saw him out as Dan waved the two of them off and turned back to her. 'Thanks for helping out,

'I didn't know there was as much to it as all that, thought it was just some bloke with a microphone and a CD player.'

'You feel like you might want to give it a go?' He broached. 'It'd be good not having to train somebody up again, I'm not the best teacher at this. I'm a push the button and she what it does kind of learner really.'

'You did alright, quite like this kind of thing. Bit like trying to tape songs off the radio at home, except there's more risk of messing it up with this.'

'Good, great. So you're coming back next week?' _Fuck yes, a thousand fucks yes_

'Can I think about it?' She didn't want to sound too eager but he seemed to accept the answer well enough. With a nod he opened the door out for her and they took their belongings and left.

At least nothing had caught fire.


	5. Chapter 5

_Dear Diary,_

 _For the last hour I've had to contend with Bob Dylan's back catalogue being blasted on repeat from Bob's room. I'm getting sick of it now. I can see the resemblance he's going for with the windswept hair and the glasses now. He's even got the brooding loner thing down since he came back over the weekend. He rang his girlfriend yesterday and I haven't seen him since. Not sure if it's a good sign or a bad one. None of us are brave enough to find out._

 _It's all stopped, total silence from his room now. There's two boxes full of stuff out in the hallway and when I went to look it's all full of all these photos and memorabilia he's collected. All the photos are cut up and there's CDs and a pair of sunglasses stuffed in down the side. He hasn't come out of his room yet_

 _Apparently she just came back to his for the break and said it was a joke. That he was a joke. He said he just didn't want to be "Kevin from accounting." Not much to do apart from leave some comfort food outside the door and albums that don't have anything with minor notes._

None of them were paying attention the moment it went tits up. The weeks had taken on a routine where Rae would finish her last class of the day on Fridays and head over to the studio with some magazines each week, there wasn't an official shift but the job was basically hers. It was days away from the Christmas break. The three of them were sat reading or flicking through stacks of CDs for the night, their thoughts were on all the free time they'd have away from classes and each other. It was just a normal humdrum Friday night. and Chris had been busy reading over his prompts and rehearsing them during the ad break when the music decided to stop playing.

* * *

The panic that ensued after the announcements was nothing short of theatrical while the wires were pulled out and machines hit on the side as if to beat them into submission.

Ten minutes of total silence live on air had passed when Rae looked to Ewan and then to Chris who both continued to struggle with the cables in the next room. The cursing and swearing could be heard in muffled tones through the glass on the other side when her hand was forced to act. Maybe it had been the cheeky three quarters of a can of beer she'd had that spurred her on. As if she had just submerged herself in ice water her whole body felt charged as she reached out to her mic and pushed the button on.

The red button flashed on and her mouth went dry and her stomach burned. She could start to feel the itch and the scratching sound in the back of her head bubble to the surface. It took what felt like minutes for her to finally stop shaking and speak, but when she did her voice was eerily steady as she spoke into the mic.

'This is Rae stepping in for Chris tonight. If you're just tuning in we're trying something a bit different. We want you to call-in with your stories. I want to hear your worst hangover stories. I want to hear it from waking up in a field to waking up next to the crypt keeper. The best ones get the track of their choice played an' there's some t-shirt up for grabs. So, give us a ring.'

Despite the screaming going on in the back of her head to do the opposite she kept talking. Nobody knew who she was anyway. Nobody could see her here. Just her voice, and it gave her a surge of confidence. She yammered on, unable to stop about the kind of things people talked about in pubs while they nursed their pints and talked nonsense to fill the silence when the first calls came red dots started to slowly add up and Ewan made his way back into the room. He looked to her for approval and pushed the button ready for their first caller.

Chris put his thumbs up twenty minutes later at them through the Glass and Ewan left to join him. They were back on for tunes and the relief was palpable between them. Rae turned her attention back to the mic and slipped her headphones on to listen.

'Looks like we've got our first victim.' She gives a signal to put the first person on air. 'Okay, so, what's your hangover story?'

'Hi,' the voice sounded like she felt right then. Nervous and shaky. He cleared his throat and started, 'when I was seventeen I was trying to get into this over eighteen club. I was out with my mates and they'd all managed to get in fine. I'd taken a load of shots and could barely walk, and when I got to this gorgeous bird on the front desk I was so pissed I projectile vomited over the desk and all over her. I ran out but I'm assuming I'm banned. Haven't showed my face in the city centre since,' he laughed nervously and coughed. 'Never lived it down.'

'You know what? I'm going to give you that one,' the warmth in her voice came through the speakers and she smiled into the mic in commiseration. 'What do you want me to stick on for you?'

'Do you have Tubthumping by Chumbawumba?'

'Done. Here's Tubthumping coming up after the break. We want to hear more of your stories so, here's that number again if you want to phone in.'

Rae rattled off the number and slid off her headphones, leaning back into her chair and letting the breath she'd been holding out. Ewan stepped into the room again and sat down in the chair opposite her, flopping his arms down to the ground like he'd been deflated.

'Nice one, you want Chris to step in or are you good to keep on?'

'I think I'll keep on for a bit.' She eventually caught her breath. He smiled her way and resumed control of the board with Chris stepping in to take over the prompts.

The calls continued into the night and she laughed along at the increasingly cringe-worthy tales of alcohol fuelled stupidity and it felt...right. It was comfortable almost. It was as though it was something that just clicked in her somewhere. She could see herself doing this years and years down the line where before it had been a distant blur. The nerves and adrenaline were all worth it if she got to feel like this when she talked into the mic. When she got to play her sets. She felt as though she could do this forever and she desperately wanted the chance.

When it was over they packed everything up and waited for the last person to get their things to leave before the lights went off.

'You did alright. You could use a load of practice, but you were actually alright.' Chris gave her an approving look.

'Cheek,' he put his hands up in mock surrender at the half-hearted frown she shot at him.

'There's a slot on Sunday night's that's just tracks back to back for filler. There's about an hour at six in the morning. You could try it out when we get back from break.' He tugged on his jacket while she mulled it over. 'It's yours. If you want it.'

'Yeah,' she grinned, 'yeah. I'll take it, cheers m'dear.'


	6. Chapter 6

_Dear Diary,_

 _It's getting closer to 1999, just a few weeks to go. We'll get to know what Prince The Artist Formerly Known as Prince was banging on about. We're a year away from the millennium, how massive is that? At some point Disco 2000 is going to sound old. It's a weird idea, that song, waiting all that time to meet up with people you lose contact with. That it'll all change completely._

 _I got a few birthday cards through and a postcard from Mum. My present is to follow apparently. She wants me to visit, can't see her coughing up a plane picket though. She'd probably want me to swim or something. Everybody's heading home or on to internships so I've got the flat to myself for a bit. That means no football, no identity crises or polemic rants about the politics of wearing a skirt. Chloe's coming round for a couple of days in-between so it shouldn't be too bad._

The books for the past two weeks had been Plath. She had avoided the class discussions about it for the most part seeing as her table had one or two people who talked enough for the six of them for the last session. At first Rae had dreaded the idea of reading either of them but her winging it and just reading the summary wasn't going to cut it when the exams rolled around.

* * *

 _The Bell Jar_ had sat on her bedside table for days before Rae reluctantly read the first few chapters and to her surprise she actually appreciated it, enjoyed it wasn't the right word considering, but it struck a chord by the time she had read through to her selected poems.

The topic of discussion shifted from revision hints over what was coming up to Ariel and the consensus was that Sylvia Plath had written about her own life in all of them. Her lecturer, Professor Cathcart drew a line in red pen down the middle of the whiteboard and then perched herself onto an empty table at the front to listen. She was an older woman with silver threads through deep brown hair with a uniform of oversized jumpers over dark pencil skirts. Her voice was one of those quiet whispery tones you sometimes heard on books on tape which made tutorials that bit less daunting when presenting ideas.

'Is _Ariel_ autobiographical? There's a fine line to be made here I think. So,' she slid off the edge of the table in the front of the box room and moved back to the whiteboard. 'If these tables here want to take the autobiographical route' she pointed with her marker to the left hand side, 'you can start looking through for quotes from the biography handout and contrast it with the poem.' She pointed to the table Rae sat at. 'And if this lot wants to argue the opposite then do the same and we'll come back in about twenty minutes to see what we've got for both arguments.'

The room quietened down to hushed murmurs as the two sides of the class scanned though their copies. Her table had been reading through _Lady Lazarus_ and had so far come up empty when Rae spoke up.

'It might have been based on her life, but I don't think it's actually about her.'

'She was in a New York magazine internship though,' Holly, a girl she sometime sat beside looked up from the table beside hers, 'and a load of stuff from her biography comes up in this.' She pulled out the other book and placed it down on the table.

'Yeah, that's _The Bell Jar_ though, that's her semi-autobiography.'

'It says she was admitted to hospital after two attempts in nineteen fifty-three.'

'In the poem there's three though. You can write about stuff you know about but that doesn't make it autobiographical. Just because you can use things that happened in your life doesn't mean it's actually about them. She just used her own experiences.'

'It's got all the bits in it about her father, they didn't have a good relationship. That's the same in _Lady Lazarus_ though.'

'Yeah, I know,' she submitted, 'but you can base things on your life but it's not the same as it actually being about her.'

The two sides argued back and forth for the hour when their lecturer wound everything up and handed the last essay marks before the break and a reminder about the exams and they were free to go. The class mulled out with chatter about pub nights and doing exactly naff all for the foreseeable future.

On the walk back home she thought about _The Bell Jar_ again and the part about the Fig tree. That she was sitting in the middle of one too and there were all these branches with jobs and lives she could be living. That there were all these options and paths with what she could do with her life but she couldn't pick any of them. At some point everybody had have to make a choice. That there were all these choices she can make at any time, but once she made them all the other possibilities, all the other figs would wither and die if she did. It wasn't an idea she liked, even though the words were right. She never was any good at change. At least she wasn't alone in that one.

Rae turned her thoughts away from it and thought instead that in a few hours she'd be seeing Chloe and her mood instantly brightened.

It had been about an hour and there was no sign of Chloe, not under the arrivals board or in any of the shops in the station. She was nowhere to be found. Rae had started to think she'd been held up and started the walk back home after one last sweep of the station for any sign of her friend.

After coming up empty she left and started the walk back to ring her to see if she'd been kept back at college, if she'd changed her mind about visiting. It had been bucketing all day and it was in the minus degrees outside so she'd been in a hurry to avoid getting her converse soaked through when she spotted her.

'Chloe?' Rae tilted her head as she walked past the corner shop. She was standing under the stripped plastic awning above the door with her arms folded over her chest and the strap of her bag tight across her rain soaked winter coat.

'Rae, oh my god,' she dropped her bag down from her shoulder and crossed the distance to hug her friend tightly. She was about ten minutes away from the train station where she was supposed to be. Rae only noticed her standing under the shop awning because she was passing it on her way down to collect her from the terminal.

'What are you doing? You were supposed to meet me at the-'

'Got lost didn't I. I was going to surprise you at the door.' Chloe shook her head and rolled her eyes with a smile. She fished a crumpled map out from the pocket of her bag and stared down at it and back up to the street names on the buildings above them. Rae moved to stand beside Chloe and looked down to where she was following the red and blue lines with her index finger on the paper in agitation when she spotted it.

'Chlo.'

'What?'

Instead of answering Rae laughed and took the map, rotating it around before handing it back. 'You went there instead of here,' she pointed.

Chloe blinked a moment and then huffed. 'It all looks the same. I've been going in a sodding circle.' She propped herself against the wall and ran the back of her hand across her forehead and pulled a face at the sheen of sweat sticking to the front of her face and hair. 'There's too many windy bits, how do you manage?'

'You get used to it,' Rae rolled her eyes at her, 'Right come on back to the flat and we'll dump your stuff and I'll take you sightseeing later, come on.' Rae took one of her bags and wrapped an arm around her friend as they walked their way back home.

They got to the flat and Chloe dumped her damp coat on the radiator and settled in unpacking. At first it was weird having Chloe there. Before the space in her flat and the city in general had felt like a totally separate life from everything else, but the idea died down and she cobbled some mugs of tea and what was left of the food from the fridge together and sat it down on the coffee table between them.

Chloe had gone to dry off and emerged in a sweatshirt and leggings with her hair pulled up into a loose bun. The TV was tuned onto Friends and she sat down beside her and they argued who was more like who and which of the blokes they'd choose if they had to.

'Joey, definitely joey. He's a laugh and he's the nicest one out of them bar Phoebe.'

'I like Chandler,' Chloe shifted in her seat with her arm sticking out from the arm of the couch. 'He just seems like a good bloke. I dunno.' She turned to her with a more serious face but her voice was the same. 'How's Uni treating you? You don't talk about it much.'

'Honestly? Chloe, it's great. I love the classes and the nights out; maybe not some of the people but I've got this radio show with one of the guys that lives here, got an internship lined up in a bit for a few months through somebody one of the other guys there, Chris, knows. So, I'm just about sorted. What about you Missus. You weren't great on the phone last time either.'

'There's a couple of girls from class that've been brilliant. They're a bit serious, but they're good. They're really good, they're looking out for me. You lookin' after yourself?'

'I've been talking to somebody here,' Rae nodded and fiddled with the hole in her jumper sleeve. 'The Uni gave us these handbooks back at the start and there's this building further down where you can drop in whenever. There's this one woman I speak to most, we just chat about things and make sure I'm coping with deadlines and things. I haven't been in a while. Sometimes it's good just knowing they're there if I need to talk. I like that it's always an option even if I feel like I don't need it.'

Chloe just stared at her with an odd expression that wasn't quite tearful but looked close to it.

'What?'

'I'm just dead proud of you Rae.' That brought out a sob and she wiped at her eyes with the sleeve of her top.

'Come here,' Rae gave her a small laugh for being daft and drew her into a cuddle.

'I've got something to tell ya, well, something to ask.' Chloe settled herself into the couch and dragged a cushion over her chest. Rae's heart twinged. The last few times Chloe had said that immortal phrase had been pretty monumental things, and they were never usually good. She braced herself but found she didn't need to when she saw Chloe smile.

'I was thinking,' she shifted her knee to her chest and cradled the mug in her hand, 'when's your next break?'

'Erm in a couple of weeks I think, why?'

'Izzy's invited us to an end of unit thing later on. Some design show. Fancy it? I told her I'd ask you.'

'I dunno, can't really afford to stay in a B&B or anything just now.'

'Don't be stupid, you're staying round with me at mine. My parents will be away then to some ski thing. They don't even like it, think they just go to keep up with my dad's golf mates. I'm housesitting so I've got the whole place to myself, could use the company.'

'Chlo,' she wanted to let her down gently the idea was a nice one, a nice one but also not a good one. It would be like unwinding all the threads of the life she'd started to make for herself. It would be comfortable, she didn't think she really needed comfortable.

'Please.'

'I don't know,' she hated how difficult it was to tell her no when she made that annoying pleading voice.

'Please, please babe. Izzy was dead excited about it when I spoke to her.'

She thought of the gang. Of Izzy finishing her first year at textile college and how chuffed she was for her. She thought of seeing Chop and getting one of his bear hugs, of Archie, Mr. University banging on about the latest Alexander The Great publication or whoever he had moved onto next. About Danny and the stories he's come out with. She thought about Finn, dangerous territory, but it came all the same. Of all the missed craptastic music charts to argue over, of soft overgrown hair and conspiratory looks when Chop said something daft. If they were even all doing to be there, it might just the four of them this time and the thought softened her resolve.

'Alright.' Chloe broke out into a smile and Rae held her hand up.

'Don't make a big deal out of it will you? It's just a fly by visit. I'm heading straight back. I've got exams and that.'

'I promise, no plans. I swear. Just the lot of us hanging out for a couple of days.' Rae didn't quite believe her but they soon settled as the night drew in. They top and tailed across the too small mattress in her room and the duvet was already getting used in a quasi-round of tug-of-war between them for control of the cover.

'Chloe,'

'Yeah?'

'Get your feet out of my face.'

That just earned her a spluttering peal of laughter and they were suddenly all of eight years old again sharing secrets and laughs and talking about all the places they were going to go while she was there. Of records and one-off clothes shops long past dawn.


	7. Chapter 7

_Dear diary,_

 _This is the longest train journey is the history of mind numbingly boring train journeys. The walkman's ran out of batteries, again. I've been scribbling stuff here for the last two and a half hours. Finished my book and written out my setlists for the next while. Feels like that old woman from the titanic, it's been eighty four years stuck in this seat._

 _Not sure what I'm actually going to do when I get off, but that's not the point._

 _Are we there yet?_

If it had been weird for Chloe to be in Bristol if felt even weirder to be back in Stamford. Chloe picked her up from the train station in the morning and drove them through the familiar shops and side streets as they sped past her passenger side window view. The houses and the park gave her a strange sense of alienation and ease all at once. It was like stepping into toy town in comparison to the world she knew out at large. Had it always been that small?

* * *

The car pulled into the gravel driveway of Chloe's house and the two of them gathered up their things from the boot of the car and Chloe opened the door out for her to step through. It was odd walking into an empty house. Not having to ignore the thinly veiled disapproving looks when she walked through the door. Just the sound of Chloe dumping her keys in the bowl by the door and wandering into her kitchen to make them some drinks, leaving her to her own devices in the living room.

'I promise it'll just be me and Izzy you can speak to,' Chloe emerged from the kitchen with a take-away menu, some glasses and a bottle of coke and put them down between them on the couch. 'Chop as well, obviously.'

She doesn't have to say what she means, who she means, but the answer is there on her face. It had been two years, it wasn't the same, wasn't like that anymore.

'It's fine.' Rae took her glass off the white leather couch and opened the bottle to pour them both a drink.

'You won't even know anybody else is there, I can keep you occupied when we're there then we can come back here and watch come crap flims before you've got to go back.' She switched the TV over and curled her legs up onto the couch. 'Make a night of it, just you and me.'

'It's fine Chloe, really. I don't mind. I don't even think about it anymore.'

'I will though Rae, I promise. It'll just be us for the weekend.'

As the night drew in they unpacked their things and Chloe helped Rae make the bed up in the spare room. She put out her clothes ready for the next day, not knowing how to feel about the next afternoon's meeting.

They waited in the car park as requested. The car ride to the textile college wasn't long at all, even thought they had been running late they still managed to be the first two there. They waited for what must have been twenty five minutes after the time they were all supposed to meet up when Chloe turned around at the sound of footsteps on the frosty pavement further down.

'We were starting to think you weren't coming,' Chloe spoke to somebody Rae couldn't see till she turned around to see Archie make his way to the edge of the car park where they stood. The glasses were still exactly the same, but the deep blue Harrington jacket was new and the height difference between them. He stood about two inches taller now. He shoved his hands in his pockets and twisted to look behind them.

'Had to collect a souvenir.' Rae wasn't sure what he was talking about until she saw him turn the corner a moment later with an overnight bag in his hand and her breath caught in her throat. Finn walked into view and the feelings she thought had died a long time ago bubbled to the surface. Two years had been good to him, really good. His hair was shorter now, he was a little bit broader in the arms and the features of his face had sharpened slightly. The eyebrows and fringe were the same and she could see his eyes brighten at the sight of the three of them as he caught up with his friend.

He nodded a greeting at Chloe who returned it with a small wave his way. He stepped towards her and gave her a tentative hug that she returned quickly and turned to Rae, taking a step forward with one foot and then stopping.

'How's Bristol?' He greeted her with the question instead and she was momentarily put out that he hadn't greeted her like Chloe when she answered.

'Yeah, it's been good. Really good,' her voice was steady much to her relief. 'What about you, you doing alright?' He looked over at her with those same warm eyes and her pulse quickened in a traitorous pace.

'I'm doing alright, yeah.' He breathed it out and crossed a hand over to his elbow and he was suddenly the same seventeen year old looking at her like that day at the park three years ago. She couldn't help but smile at him and the look between them wasn't missed by Chloe.

'Rae,' Chloe glanced at the pair of them with an odd look and took her by the arm and led her through to the hall. Rae didn't dare look back as she pulled her along with the other three following close behind.

Chop was already seated in one of the reserved rows in the front. Rae watched him bat the programme against his knee, he must have felt really out of place amongst all the pompoms and glitter from the students around him. The three of them filed into the remaining half empty row as the hall started to fill up fast. Chloe stopped for a moment and looked down to the other end and spread her hands out to signal five minutes to somebody backstage. She turned to the side and edged her way back along the row when Rae called out to her.

'Where are you going?'

'Iz just waved me over. I'll be right back,' When Rae opened her mouth to argue she was already out in the aisle. 'I'll be back in ten minutes right.'

'Chlo,' it was too late, she couldn't follow after her when the rest of the row started to fill up and she found herself between Archie on her left and Finn on the right. She was already gone down past the lighting rig and the flurry of people around the stage. That left the three of them, not awkward at all.

'Doubt we'll be getting out of this without a trip to the Swan, fancy it?' Archie leaned in close to her and nudged her shoulder. 'Could do with a break from the constant Durham questions at home. "Have you joined any clubs? Make sure you don't get distracted down there, get yourself a first" it's doing my head in.' He pushed his glasses up at the corner and gave her a small hopeful smile.

'I suppose I can grab a pint,' she tutted in a mock huff and she saw Archie smile at her. They chatted for a bit about reading lists and exams. Finn passed the both of them copies of the programme down. Rae scanned it for Izzy's name so she would know when to give her her full attention. She looked over towards the stage as Finn tucked his bag as far under the chair as he could.

'What's the overnight bag from?' That was a stupid question she probably didn't want to know the answer to.

'Munich,'

'What were you doin' in Munich?'

She didn't get her answer as the music started up mid reply. He tried to lean over Archie towards her and started to speak but she couldn't hear a word. He stopped his silent speech and gave her an apologetic look and turned his eyes back to the stage. Just as she imagined it the night before the lights flared up in bright fluorescent colours. Streamers and spotlights fell on the DIY runway and Rae watched as the parade of clothes passed by from bright purple feather covered hats to dresses that looked like glow in the dark painted bubble wrap when it looked like Izzy's designs were about to take the stage. She could see her fret her bottom lip In the distance to the left of the stage as a pink sequinned dress that could only be Izzy's made its way on the model down the stage, followed by three others; all bright and colourful as the next. Chop stood up slightly and gave her a shout of encouragement and the three of them gave her a loud cheer from their seat and she grinned over in their direction and ducked back behind the stage. Once it wrapped up they found themselves back in the car park and making their way to their cars back to Stamford.

They got to the pub and someone had just cleared out of their old table when Danny came out to greet them.

'Rae, didn't think you'd be back here,'

'It's just a flyby,' she offered and stepped in close to give him a hug. Chloe gave him a wave and sat down first, putting her bag and jacket to the side of her on the bench. Rae followed suit and sat down beside her, taking her jacket off.

'Bet they don't have these in poncey student unions,' Danny pushed a tray of luminous green drinks to the middle of the table pushing all the others out of the way. 'Call these Toxic Waste,' he waggled his eyebrows and stepped away to clear up the next table till break rolled round.

'It was brilliant,' she heard Izzy say as she and Chop made their way inside, 'but I'm glad it's finished.' She waved at the table and bounced her way over to them. 'Thanks for helping out Chloe. I was panicking it was all going to go wrong with that sequin dress.'

'No problem babe, it looked really nice one we got the glue off.' She shifted over closer to Rae to let them sit down and turned to her with a low voice. 'Sorry Rae, didn't mean to leave you for as long. Izzy was having a proper meltdown. Somebody spilled a glue gun cartridge all over her stuff.' She linked her arm through hers. 'I'll keep you distracted from now. Promise.'

'It's alright. I was just talking to Arch for most of it.' She lied, only slightly.

'Look at you Mrs. Smarty Pants, you look lovely' Izzy leaned back in her seat to get a look at her and came round to her side of the bench to wrap her up in a warm hug. 'Thanks for coming.'

'Course Iz.' The three of them settled in and Izzy sent Chop over for drinks before he had the chance to greet them. He and Danny stood talking at the bar as he made their drinks up and she turned to see Chloe give her a closemouthed smile. You alright? She mouthed and Rae nodded.

'Raemundo' she heard Chop draw her name out into a chant before she saw him. He came into sight with his usual bluster, arm full of their drinks order and an amused smile playing on his lips that broke out into a large grin as he copied Izzy and pulled her into a tight bear hug and stepped back.

The door opened again and Archie stepped through with Finn trailing his bag behind him. He sat down on the space left on the opposite side of Rae and she could feel his gaze on hers and fought not to meet it. Archie came back from the bar with he and Finn's drinks and Chop greeted him the same as Rae, with an arm clapping him round the shoulders and squeezing, nearly knocking the glasses from his nose in his enthusiasm.

'Thought you'd chucked us for a load of books,'

'I know, I know. It's just been a bit non-stop over there.' It was only a little fib. She didn't want to say that there didn't feel like there had been anything left for her here anymore. Chop seemed to accept her answer fine and gave her an affectionate nudge with the side of his arm.

'You an'all,' he shot a wounded look towards Archie.

'I sent those CDs up last month,' Archie reasoned.

'Yeah, but that's no excuse for not turning up down here, thought the lot of you had given up on us.' He cast the three of them a wounded look but he dropped it within minutes and he was back to his usual happy-go-lucky demeanour.

'Even Finny boy's off.'

'You what? When?' Archie sat up in the booth and Chloe and Rae turned to look at Finn, well, Rae tried not to.

'The big knobhead's leaving me for some travelling thing tomorrow aren't you?'

'Don't know yet, give it a rest Chop will ya,' he said in a low voice and turned to throw a glare at Chop who just shook his head and wrapped an arm around Izzy as she sipped at her drink.

'Rae's got her own radio show,' Chloe cut in and the three of them turned to look at her from their drinks. 'She's got an internship at a real one later on.'

'That's brilliant Rae, do you get to play your own music?'

'Yeah, well, there's chart stuff we've got to play but I get to pick the rest and come up with the call-in stories. I love it.' She sipped at her Snakebite and tried not to meet Finn's gaze where she could feel it bore into the side of her face.

'Perfect job for you Raemundo, you're always banging on about all that stuff when you were here,' Chop spoke with his pint hovering at his mouth. Izzy kicked him under the table and sent him a glower to shut up.

'What?' His cluelessness just sent her into a giggle and she pushed his arm.

'So, none of that mainstream stuff. No crap FM.' She finally looked beside her. The coy look Finn gave her did things to her she thought she'd gotten over long ago. She took a drink of her snakebite to get herself back in check before she answered back.

'Something like that, yeah.' She managed a nod and nearly dribbled her snakebite out of her mouth at the sensation of familiar fingers drawing towards her thigh. Finn moved his finger into letters and she pretended to listen to the table and concentrated on the words forming.

 _Talk later?_

She took a sip of her drink and gave him a subtle shake of her head at him. She hesitantly moved her hand over to his leg and drew out her reply, not looking at him in case any of the others saw.

 _No._

His brows furrowed and he stared into his drink till she wrote again.

 _Chloe._

 _You Ok?_

She nodded again and she understood what he was actually asking.

 _Good. Happy._

 _Good._

 _You? Where you going tomorrow?_

 _Doing sound for band. Small one. Tour_

 _Where?_

'Right,' Chloe put her drink down and looked over to Rae. 'We better head off so I can drop Rae off tomorrow.'

'It's only half-seven,' she laughed, wondering what she was on about.

'Rae, let's go.' She gestured her head subtly towards Finn's direction that he couldn't have missed and Rae nodded.

'I better go,'

She started to get up where Finn stood up to let her brush past him to get out.

'Suppose I won't see you around for a bit again then.'

'Probably not, no.'

'Right, well this is goodbye then,' he stayed where he stood and for a moment she was sure he was about to put his arms around her.

'Thought we were seeing them off before they go tomorrow?' Izzy looked to Chloe and Archie in question.

'Me and Rae will be there, Finn's got an early start.' Archie broached the subject and it gets quiet between the seven of them. Danny took the tray away from the table to distract himself and pottered around the bar while he listened in.

'If I have time I can try and go round for a few minutes,' Finn offered with a smile of gratitude from Izzy and Chop.

'We'll see,' is all Chloe said before she and Rae collected their stuff and gave each of them one last hug for the night.


	8. Chapter 8

_Dear Diary,_

 _Maybe I should have_

 _Could have tried to find time to_

 _Sod it, It might not have even made any difference even if I had managed to_

 _Counting sheep isn't working_

 _I keep waking up and end up staring at the Artex on the ceiling._

 _Fuck it._

When she closed her eyes that night she could almost feel the warmth of his skin. Where his fingers had traced her thigh with the words, nerves dancing. That scent of him as he sat close. She felt the loss of him again as soon as she uncrossed her arms from her stomach. All this time had passed with him back home without her, there was all this time she'd lost. Was it stupid to wish for what came before? A time ago She couldn't imagine them having an after. Everything she'd tried to stifle came flooding back in as she lay there and tried to think of something, anything else.

* * *

She hadn't acted on it. She could have. She wanted to. It would have been so easy just to grab his hand out from The Swan and go somewhere like he asked and tell him all the things she'd bottled up from all that time; but the thoughts that came with the idea brought a load of unwanted things along with it. _Bad idea, bad idea bad idea_. When he'd came close to her, her thoughts were already filled with the soft feel of his golden brown hair between her fingers. Those tentative glances she knew so well, of bottomless brown eyes darting to her lips with that coy smile, eyebrows raised in silent question as he seeped back in to her mind.

Shaking him was even harder after that from where she lay in Chloe's Parents spare room. It wasn't fair and she knew she was doing nobody any favours. Hated that she was even thinking about any of that stuff.

Her brain was a traitor again and for a moment she was back under the insipid blue early morning light coming from his loft bedroom window. It was one of those early odd moments years ago when everything was still new. When the usual risk of being interrupted by parents or friends wasn't an issue and they had the odd whole weekends of his dad away to be with each other by themselves. Her mind conjures it behind her eyes in full technicolour.

 _His hands graze up along the inside of her thighs and his touch feels like electricity across every nerve. She closes her eyes over and can feel his lips linger on the sweet spot above her left hip and she squirms to get him closer. He brings his face back up to meet hers and their lips meet as he runs his free hand up her side and through her hair. She draws his bottom lip between her teeth eliciting a groan from him that warms her insides like fire._

 _She's lost in him in that moment, she can't think of anything else when he draws her leg up over his hip as they move. It fills her head entirely. She tells him she loves him then, amongst all the whispers and sighs. He matches her words some time later and dances his mouth over her collarbone and the side of her neck. They end together in touches and sighs, with his soft words murmured into the nape of her neck._

 _The air around them cools after the heat dissipates from their skin and the flush is replaced with goosebumps down her arms. She hazily draws herself closer to him and he wraps her up like a vine, legs and arms linking with hers. She's aware of him talking but she isn't listening to what he's saying. Tiredness takes over with the rhythmic steady slowing of his pulse as she lays her head near his collarbone. He shifts his body nearer to hers so his side is flush against her stomach. She puts a hand on his chest and feels the steady rise and fall of his breaths. His hand trails down the soft skin of her bare arm and it ignites a pleasant shiver. It brings her out of the blissful trance he's made._

 _'Oasis might end up like Dire Straits. I'll be shuffling records at the kids to get them to listen.'_

 _'Yeah', she moves herself so she can see his glance down at her. She feels his hand comb her hair distractedly, 'but Oasis are actually good. We could be drooling in a chair at an old folks home and I'd still pull you up in your Zimmer frame and dodgy slippers to dance when it comes on.'_

 _'Oi,' he scoffs at her. 'Slippers?' He looks down at her with warm eyes and rests his chin on the top of her head. 'Think I'm more likely to go bald like my dad an' collect a load of old CDs from car boot sales nobody wants, d'you reckon?'_

 _'I think so. I think you'd still manage to look alright.' She combs a hand through the ends of his hair and sweeps his fringe back as if she's picturing it. He laughs and she feels the vibration of it from her head to her toes._

 _'Do you?'_

 _'Do I what?'_

 _'Do you think about it, about us?' His eyes take on a sheen despite their almost black colour. When he looks at her like that her insides ignite again. His stare is so warm and vulnerable and her breath catches in her throat._

 _He's quiet after those last words. As though he knows what she's going to say before it leaves her mouth. It hangs between them and she can feel the air shift again._

 _'Please don't. I can't'_

 _'What d'you mean?'_

 _It's silent and he starts to think she isn't going to speak when her voice breaks the silence._

 _'I don't want to end up like my mum.' He takes what she's saying in, like he understands what she's trying to say. That she's scared he'll go like her dad and that would just be-_

 _'You're not your mum Rae,' he brings his arm across her chest to draw her closer. 'I'm not goin' anywhere. Unless you know something I don't.' He tries to bring her round but the idea's already in her head. 'I don't want to be like my dad, but we're not them Rae. We're us.' He makes sure he's looking at her as he says it, makes sure she hears it._

 _It's not that she doesn't want to think of their future, she just can't. It's hard enough to think past right now. She's never been good at looking past the next week never mind years from now. Right now she has these amazing things she never thought she could have and if she thinks about it, it just makes it easier to imagine it all being taken away at any second. She can't articulate any of this, it's trapped in her and she knows it's leaving him stranded and wondering where they even stand with any of it._

 _They lie there like that in those early hours until it's light enough to get dressed and drop her off back home._

She pulls herself out of it and sits up in the spare bed. He'd dropped it then and she hated the heaviness it brought. She wondered if things would be different if she'd said something then. If he'd asked in another moment.

She wanted to call him and tell him that she did think about growing older; sometimes. That when she did it had terrified her beyond belief, but that it made her just as excited when she allowed herself to accept it all. That she could see them further down the line. All those nights when the world went still around them, when all she could feel or care about were the way the patterns his deft fingers left her skin feeling ignited wherever he touched her. They could stretch on further than she had any right to imagine.

She just wasn't there yet, not then; but it didn't mean she never would be, and it had been so big then. This wide chasm between where they were and where they could be at some point. It scared her. Being with him felt like more than she could have ever hoped for and more. Things were so right between them as they were that it scared her about it changing. It could all get taken away just as quick as it had come together again and there was no way it wouldn't have finished her. The weight of it felt so huge in her hands, so delicate.

He took it all on and she knew it must have tired him when she'd sink. Some of the ups came with huge downs that she couldn't see a way out of. She kept things and didn't always say what was going on in her head or most of the time how she felt. She showed it though, or she thought he knew it through her actions. It was never the things they said with the two of them, it was always what they did that showed what they felt. That was who they were. It was always there with every touch and gesture when the words weren't.

She wasn't an easy person to love but neither was he, she forgot sometimes that he was moody and distant when he wanted to be, especially early on. He never wanted to push her even when she might have needed him to. He could be spiteful and cut her off if he was angry or needed the space. He was a monumental prick at times and she was a gobby cow; but the good had always cancelled out the bad. Hadn't it?

It had happened anyway. What she was so scared of. Just not how she had expected it to.

They just faded away slowly till one morning she couldn't remember the last time they had shared a joke or listened to a new album. That hurt worse somehow than a screaming row. A screaming row showed you still cared, you still had a bit of fight between you. That they could have gone from being everything to almost nothing at all.

Rae shifted in the bed and tossed and turned in the unfamiliar room wishing Chloe was as sleepless as she was so they could talk before they had to leave again. It was five before she could shut her eyes over at all.


	9. Chapter 9

_Dear Diary,_

 _I survived. Just. I don't know if it's nostalgia that's making me like this or if I'm genuinely going to miss being back here. It's stupidly early but I must just not need sleep as much this morning._

 _Got everything organised for the trip home. I just need to wait for Chloe to wake up and we can head down to see everyone off wherever they've decided we're going._

 _Where is there that's even open at this hour apart from about two places? We'll see. Hopefully Chloe gets up soon. I don't like waiting. Makes everything worse._

She should have known they'd end up back at The Golden Plaice. It was one of the few places open at that time in the morning that made anything decent to eat. Unfortunately her toast sat only half eaten and she twisted the cup of tea in her hands absently as it grew cold. She couldn't eat, feeling an unfamiliar sense of uneasiness at the thought of saying goodbye. There were just the five of them this time. Danny had said his goodbye last night and hadn't finished his shift until a few hours before. There was no sign of Finn and she felt a traitorous pang in her chest that she shook off and looked to the others.

'Tellin' you, don't be strangers the pair of ya'. I'm not waiting about for you lot next time. We'll bring it up to yours. Either of you.' Chop looked from Rae to Archie with what passed for a serious look and an agreement from Izzy.

'Right, all right. I'll visit. No need for threats,' Archie scoffed and shot an amused look to the rest of them. Rae smiled weakly and looked over to Chloe who was picking at the sides of her bread crust. The five of them were more subdued than normal and Rae wished she could brush it off and tell them they were all invited back to University with her. She joined in with the usual messing about between the five of them when she caught Chop stop laughing and follow his eyes over someone outside.

The bell jingled above the door and he was there. Finn opened the door out and stepped through making her pulse fasten and tried not to recant her thoughts from last night. She watched him out of the corner of her eye from the door as he put his keys into his pocket and didn't take his eyes off of her.

'Alright lads?' She couldn't quite look him in the eye as he moved past the door and to their table to sit down.

'You're late,' Archie chided him.

'Couldn't get off the phone. Thought I'd missed it.'

'Speaking of missing things,' he looked down at his watch and exhaled. 'I need to get doing. I need to be back before four.' Archie pushed his toast towards the end of the table and went to get up. There were hugs and tears everywhere, especially from Chop who kept turning around so avoid being seen. Rae moved first and wrapped her arms round him and gripped him tightly, followed by Izzy and Chloe where the three of them huddled together when they each let go and she stepped back feeling her breath hitch. Finn was next and gripped him across the top of his arms for a time and they shared a muted few words before he let him go. Chop was last and opened his arms out wide. Archie stepped into them enclosing them both in a hug and a manly pat on the back on his release.

As Archie got into his car outside they followed out after him and waved him off together. Finn took the opportunity while the rest were distracted and twined his fingers through hers pulling her with him further down to one of the benches outside. Rae sat herself down and ran her hand through what was left of the plants in the concrete flowerbed behind her head. Finn followed after her and she waited for him to speak.

'Everything alright?'

'I just wanted to catch you properly before you left. Before I left.'

'Thought you just came back from somewhere.'

'They're- well I'm sorting the sound out for this band.' He looked to her to make sure she remembered his words from last night at the pub and she nodded. 'They want me to head down to Dover and then we're down to Lille, somewhere in France. Can't pronounce it so I'm a bit stuffed. Last minute change of plan. I just got off the phone before I came.'

'What time d'you have to be there for?'

'Technically I should already be on the road,' Rae sat straight on the bench and he gave her a look of reassurance that it was alright.

'Needed to see everybody off first. They won't notice for a while yet anyway.' He leaned in towards her and spoke under his breath 'traffic was a nightmare.' He gave her a conspiratory look and she nodded slyly.

'How long for?'

'Not sure. As long as really. We're just heading down to wherever they can get a gig for now.' He fiddled with the zip of his jacket, not meeting her eyes.

'That's brilliant.' It took a large amount of effort to keep her voice even despite how tight her throat felt.

'Yeah, never been anywhere further than Butlins.' His voice sounded off despite the small smile at her words.

'Do you even know any French?'

'Got GCSE bits and pieces somewhere in here,' he gestured to his head. 'Got the only one I need memorised anyway.'

'Go on then.'

'Bonjour je voudrais mon livre,' his French was broken, the pronunciation all wrong even with her own rubbish French skills, but she understood that part. Her eyebrows frowned down in confusion.

'You want your book?'

'Does livre not mean money?'

'Lira, you mean.' She let out a small smirk. 'Think that's Spain or somewhere, maybe.'

'Right,' he let out a breathy laugh and looked down at his lap till she broke the silence.

'Where's Chloe when you need her. She's the French speaker.'

'Looking over here apparently,' she darted a glance over and saw Chloe looking towards them from outside the shop. She looked to Rae, worried her bottom lip and turned back after seeing she'd been caught. When she looked back over Rae mouthed that she was alright and Chloe turned back around to the others. She heard him take in a breath of his own and met his gaze before he spoke.

'Are-are you keeping alright?'

'Yeah, well, ups and downs. Same as usual, but yeah.' He was looking at her so intently that she dropped her eyes again. If she did she knew she'd end up saying things that wouldn't help either of them. Stay. Don't go.

'Had this week a while back where things got a bit on top of me. Everything was coming in all at once and it was just daft things like triple checking I've locked the door or re-reading stuff I've written to make sure I haven't put something weird down. Nothing major, nothing I can't cope with.'

'Good. I'm glad.' He leaned back into the flowerbed. 'I'm happy for you; about that radio internship an'all. They'd be daft not to take you on. You and that infinite knowledge of music.'

She could hear the teasing tone in that last sentence and smiled down at the ground and looked back over at him with false arrogance.

'That's what I've been telling them, somebody's finally listened.'

'Only a matter of time really.'

'Rae, that's half past.' Chloe's hesitant voice cut through them and she gestured for her to give them a few minutes.

'I'm really happy for you Rae, that you're happy.'

'You too, you're going to love all that travelling.'

'Can I get a goodbye?'

'You never have to ask you dickhead.' He brightened at their word of affection and stepped towards her. Their arms instinctively circled one another and she relaxed into his embrace taking all of him in. She felt a light pressure on the side of her head before he stepped back to look at her, still standing close.

'Keep looking after yourself.'

'You too, drive safe yeah?'

He stepped away from her and the cold air cut into her where his warmth left her. Rae watched as he gave each of the others brief hugs goodbye leaving Chloe last who flung her arms round him to his surprise. Finn started his walk and turned around again to give them a final wave. The realisation that this was probably the last she was going to see him knocked the wind out of her.

'Bye guys,' she breathed out feeling pained. 'We'll do this again at some point.' Before she might have said it as a white lie, now she actually welcomed it, more than welcomed it.

'Good luck with the radio stuff,' Izzy called out as Rae got into Chloe's car and she gave them a last wave as the car pulled away from the curb and they were off. It was a few minutes before Chloe spoke to her.

'You alright?'

'Course I'm alright. It's a good thing. I'm happy for him.' She stepped into the passenger side and fidgeted with her seatbelt for a moment when she turned to her friend. 'Is that what all the chauffer stuff was about?'

'I only knew about it because of Izzy. Chop told her and you know what Izzy's like with that stuff.'

'Sounds brilliant, all those amazing places and music.'

'Jammy sod,' Chloe agreed keeping her eyes on the road ahead. 'He'll be over there with all the cafes and bars, and you know what European women are like.'

'No, I really don't.'

'All leggy and,' she didn't have another word and instead decided to waggle her eyebrows and shook her shoulders at her.

'You do talk some rubbish sometimes chlo, you really do.' She laughed but it did stir up emotions she had no right to be feeling and attempted to push them back. The rest of the journey was filled with the low level music from the radio and the train station loomed into view not long after. They collected Rae's things from the boot of the car and Rae shouldered her bag, making sure to fish out her tickets so she was ready to board.

'Give me a ring when you get home so I know you got back safe.'

'Okay mum,' Rae pulled a childish face at her and Chloe gave her a look of mock consternation of her own right back and she relented. 'Course I will.' She pulled her into one last hug and Chloe wiped at the tear forming on her eye and watched Rae walk through the barrier and onto the train home.

The train ride back felt quicker. The only problem this time was being left alone to her thoughts. She hadn't expected it to be nearly as hard to say goodbye. It felt so much more final and she didn't know how to feel.


	10. Chapter 10

_Dear Diary,_

 _Nothing much to report. Same old same old so far._

 _It's actually good to be home, sort of. I forgot all the passive aggressive warfare going on. Somebody's tried to cook again and they've left a weird brown ring over the middle of the cooker that nobody has bothered to touch. There should be biohazard tape over the whole kitchen. Nobody's done the dishes and the toilet paper keeps going missing. Either they're hoarding it somewhere or they're doing some kind of modern art paper Mache with it._

 _We're heading towards having to write our names on the stuff in the fridge that we bought with the arguments over who nicked all the milk and the last egg._

 _I've bought paper plates so I can just bin them when I'm done. Dishes be dammed._

It was a few days after she'd gotten home to the welcoming covers of her bed. Things had carried on as normal and the end of the week came around in a blur. For the most part she had spent her time putting most of her effort into catching up on the reading until she had worked her way through most of it and onto the extra parts just to keep herself occupied. Things felt better when she kept her mind busy.

She had sat in the studio keeping an eye of Chris's slot and took the occasional call-in, spending the remaining time messing about with him and Ewan between the ad breaks. Music was still a great distraction and she was using it to the maximum that Friday night while she flicked through her copy of NME.

'Rae,' she didn't even hear Chris come into the next room. Her eyes were busy scanning over an article about the Red Hot Chili Peppers upcoming Californication tour and their European leg. They'd be in Leeds next August after Belgium and Paris. Her mind unwillingly wandered to France and beautiful French women filling the cafes, bars and gigs she couldn't.

'Earth to Rachel,' Chris brought her out of it by waving a hand over her face and blocking the rest of the article.

'Sorry,' she blinked herself out of her daydream, 'what?'

'I said are you still up for Amped next year?'

'Chris, you do know that's next week?'

'I know, just winding you up. Mark's put you down for Saturdays. He's a really good guy, you'll like him.'

Mark was a distant relative of Chris who had managed to get him a job lined up as soon as he graduated in the head office at full pay. He worked as a presenter at Amped Radio down at Clifton and he'd been kind enough to set her up with her internship at the end of February next year. The only way it could have been better is if she was actually getting payed as much for it herself.

'Saturday?' She had hoped for a mid-week day. Her whole week would be filled up. She'd hoped to save at least one day to keep up with her classes.

'It's the only time I could get you.'

'No, it's fine. I just need to bring my work with me.'

'Cracking. I'm heading round there tomorrow so I'll let him know to expect you still.'

'Thanks.'

'No worries. No point in having connections if you don't get to milk them for all they're worth.' Chris winked at her and grabbed his bag up from the floor. Ewan followed soon after and he and Rae shut everything off early for the evening and headed back outside. It was strange for her to think, as she passed through the doors, that a few months ago the whole idea of even being involved in anything like this had been as unthinkable as one of the Gallagher brothers going solo. In the short time since she'd reluctantly offered Ewan her help it had quickly become the dream she didn't think she would ever have a chance with. Life was strange that way, constantly throwing the unexpected. Whether she liked it or not.

The two of them made their way back to the flat and found that the door to the flat was already open when Ewan put his keys into the door. It swung open with Kevin and Sam already on the other side with their bags and coats on.

'Coming round to the chippy?'

'Yeah, two seconds.' Rae stepped through and went into her room to dump some things out of her bag and run a hairbrush through her hair. They waited for her outside the door and she locked it from the other side and followed the three of them down past the windy cobbled street to their usual post-pub chip shop destination.

They made their way inside and took a table by the window. The seats were made of cracking blue plastic and cheap garden furniture tables, but they made the best-well the cheapest chips and it was close enough to the pub and home that it had become their choice out of habit. It was a dive but it was their dive. Rae sipped at her coke as Sam smothered her chips in tomato sauce and stabbed at them with her fork, failing to pick anything up through the thick layer of sauce.

'So I was thinking that we'd all go out somewhere for New Year.'

'Thought we were staying in.' Rae glanced between the two of them sat opposite her at the table.

'And then I decided that that was the most depressing thing ever.' Sam replied as she popped open her can of coke.

'Right.'

'Where to?' Ewan shifted down in his seat and his knees grazed hers. Rae twisted her legs to the side. He gave her a gesture of apology and moved back up.

'The Blue Mountain Club.'

'Can't,' Bob-Kevin piped up. She really needed to stop calling him that first name, she kept having to catch herself when she spoke to him. So far she'd managed to avoid it by just not using names at all. 'I'm heading home for it, tradition.'

'You're such an arse,' Sam threw her hands up in a huff. 'Can you not skip it and stick with us?' He shook his head and shot Sam a sheepish smile.

'I'll make it up to you. Bring Chris,' Kevin looked to Ewan who nodded and finished the last of his drink.

'You better,' she narrowed her eyes at him teasingly and stole an onion ring from his box. He swatted at her hand and missed which earned him a smirk as she bit into it. 'So, we're settled for the Blue Mountain at nine?'

'Done, let's us get some pre-drinks before we head out.' Ewan closed his chip box over and tossed it into the bin behind him. They sat there for a few hours after that organising times to be ready for and what drinks they were going to buy from the supermarket to drink at home before they'd need to get ready. Rae had hoped for a quiet night in but relented at the idea of switching her brain off for a night with friends.


	11. Chapter 11

_Dear Diary,_

 _It's just me, Sam and Ewan here at the moment and all the naff TV we can stand. Bliss._

 _On the other hand if hear Millennium one more time I'm going to go on a rampage. I've been avoiding playing it for as long as possible, just glad I'm not at the union tonight. It'll be everywhere. Do you think it's New Year by any chance? They're doing some party with ninety-nine pence drinks till after midnight tonight. Should have gone there instead_

 _Not sure I can be bothered going out. We're heading round to one of the clubs for an all-nighter to see in the bells, but it'll good when I'm there. Always is._

New Year's Eve had crept up quickly and the three of them were in the last mercy dash to get changed and down the last of their drinks before they had to brave the cold outside. The queue would be huge outside the club, even with tickets. As they scrambled to get out the door for nine o'clock the bathroom became the subject of a tug-of-war over who got in to do their hair and make-up first. Rae fussed and near emptied the entirety of her clothes out on the bed and struggled for something to wear. Eventually after four changes of clothes Rae still managed to be the first of the girls to be ready. She opted for a cobalt blue bandeau skirt with a half sleeved black chiffon v-neck blouse tucked in and finished off with a chunky silver belt around her waist. Instead of her usual leggings and converse she switched to a thick pair of black tights and a pair of ankle boots with her normal leather jacket and blue clutch bag borrowed from Sam.

Sam came next in a silver glittery dress with towering matching heels and a thick grey winter coat. Her eyes were lined with silver cat eye eyeliner and her chestnut hair was sprayed with glitter and piled up into a loose bun at the back of her neck. It took Ewan all of three minutes to get ready much to the annoyance of the other two. He came out of his room after the two girls sat down to wait on the couch in a white button down shirt paired with dark jeans, polished black shoes and a dark charcoal coloured jacket.

'Right, let's motor.' Ewan grabbed his keys off the table and the other two followed him out, locking the door behind him.

Chris met them further down from the Flat and they started the long walk. It was freezing; heels were a bad idea on reflection; a hilariously awful idea considering they'd have to climb up the cobblestones after who knows how many drinks to get home. Sam wrapped her arm around Rae's to keep them both steady as they descended down the streets and made their way to the club.

As promised they made their way to The Blue Mountain for nine. The line had turned out to be massive but they managed to bypass some of the line for people without reservations into one with people with tickets that Sam had got hold of just before they sold out days before. The club was packed with people crammed in just about everywhere, but mostly on the dancefloor. Fluorescent blue, purple and green strobes flared and lights flashed across the sea of bodies. The first song that they came in to was a remix of Looking for love and Rae jokingly made to turn her heel and leave when Sam laughed and pulled her back.

The bar was completely mobbed so they gave each other their drink order and agreed to split up to see who could get served first then meet back in the left corner near the seats. The tune changed to a fast paced medley of tracks fading into each other and the dancefloor got slightly more crowded which made for a good time to get the first round in. Rae had struggled for a bit against the queue till she squeezed herself into a spot in the middle of the bar and waited to catch the attention of the increasingly harassed looking bar staff. Eventually she locked eyes with a blond who nodded towards her as he poured out a last coke for someone else. He closed the till and wandered over to take her request.

'A vodka and orange, two pints of Red Stripe and a snakebite please.' He nodded at her and moved to get the glasses at the other side of the bar. Rae slid back from the counter to stand straight as she waited and felt someone press into her from the side. Looking over she was greeted by Ewan again with a twenty folded between his fingers and leaned his forearms on the counter.

'Sam's said she and Chris'll be round at the booths once they get served. What're you having? My shout.'

'You're ok, the barman's just about done with my round,' he couldn't quite hear her so she pointed, 'but cheers anyway.'

'Oh right, no problem.' He didn't say anything after that and the quiet between them got noticeably heavy despite the thump of the music emanating from the speakers around them. When she looked again he stared ahead at the bar as he waited. She found herself speaking up before she had time to think. She leaned over towards him.

'If you insisted you could twist my arm for another snakebite and black though.' She gave him a warm smile and leaned on the bar top to hand over her cash to the barman with a thanks and collected the drinks. When she saw the booths Sam had been talking about she headed towards them and put her drinks down.

'Nice one,' Sam greeted her. 'I just got served there on the other side before I saw you. Here.' She passed her a shot which she took with gratitude.

'Cheers Ewan,' Sam gave the thumbs up behind Rae who turned to see Ewan with a tray full of shots and a second round of their drinks order so they wouldn't have to go back for some time. Chris followed five minutes later looking hassled and a little dishevelled like he'd been in the wars to get served and came back with an armful of their third round for the night.

'We should've thought this through more,' looking at the table Rae counted the drinks in total. They had a whole hoard of drinks cluttering the sticky black table top.

'Just means we don't have to go through that mob again. I say it's a win-win.' Chris took a pint and sat back in his seat on the inside of the black leather booth. Ewan passed Rae her snakebite and she sipped at it; not wanting any of it to spill on her clothes.

'Shit,' Sam hissed as her drink fell and clattered against her leg, staining her shoes. She let out a small huff and rolled her eyes at her clumsiness and reached over the table for the tray of shots Ewan bought. 'Is anybody drinking this one?' She pointed to the tray. 'Rae, this yours?'

'No, all yours, Ewan just got me this one just there,' Rae lifted her drink slightly and cradled it to the top of her chest. They lined up a row of shots for each of them and drank them down with ease if with a bit of disgust at the bitter kickback of the alcohol that lingered in her mouth. The music changed from one dance track to the next seamlessly and they played a game of guess the intro round while they sat. Ewan and Rae were on one Team and Sam and Chris on the other. It was a one sided game and Chris quickly got bored of having to take a drink for every win Ewan and Rae made first.

Sometime later after their first round of drinks had sank down near the bottom of their glasses they were interrupted by a shriek of delight.

'Sammy!' A dark haired girl waved at Sam frantically and cradled her bag under her arm.

'Kat, Hiya.' Sam kissed the other girl on the cheek and turned to the others when another blonde girl joined her.'This is Kat and Maya from class,' she waved her hand in a circle as their introduction. 'This is Chris, Ewan and Rae.'

'Hiya,' Rae looked over to them and they gave a small wave in greeting.

'You all coming to the floor? Everybody else is being a killjoy.'

'Can't love, think if I stand up the room's going to spin. I'll keep an eye on the drinks. On the rest of you go.' Ewan went to take another drink from his pint but was stopped by one girl, Kat, who pulled Ewan along with her. She took him by the hand and led him down to the floor and proceeded to goad him into dancing with her. Rae sent him a look of encouragement as she danced alongside Sam and the other girl. Three songs in and Sam had disappeared with no sign of her or the other girls. She stayed where she was in case she came to look for them and danced despite not particularly enjoying one or two of the tracks.

The music all started to blend together eventually apart from one track Rae recognised but couldn't quite name. It was a remix, that's what's threw her. She kept watch from where she and Ewan were dancing again for Sam who was just then sitting with a group of girls she assumed she knew. She saw her slide further and further down the booth they were in as the night wore on. She saw her laughing and just being her carefree self and guessed their foursome was now a threesome.

'Toni Di Bart,' the song artist popped into her head and she found herself saying the words out loud causing Ewan to stop to lean down to her ear

'You what?'

'The artist,' she mouthed over the music, 'it's Toni Di Bart.'

'Yeah it is,' he shouted to be heard. '"The Real Thing", nineteen ninety three.'

'That's it. It would've annoyed me all night.'

'You're freakishly good at that stuff.' He looked impressed. 'Where'd Sam go?'

'Think she went to see if the DJ would play something then went to sit with the girls. Hasn't comeback yet.' It was just the two of them then. The dancefloor was packed so it didn't feel so bad to be dancing alone. Ewan tried his best, but he wasn't a dancer he confessed. She tried to help him out with a move or two but he wasn't for any of it. The music merged and faded out to The Final Countdown intro. Rae went to excuse herself and leaned up towards Ewan's ear to let him know.

'I hate this song I'm just gonna have a seat, coming?' They couldn't move as an influx of people crowded the floor and she realised what time it was. She turned towards the Deck and watched as the room fell quiet.

'Right boys, girls and whoever else, we are just a minute away till this year bites the dust.' She didn't hear the rest of what he said over the crowd cheering. The countdown started and she joined in as the whole building seemed to join in when the countdown got to ten.

'Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven…' The DJ had played a drum beat as it got nearer and nearer time. She searched for Sam and for Chris who was where she last left him mouthing the numbers from his seat.

'Four, three, two…' She looked for Sam but was interrupted by the cheering crowd as it reached one and a stream of balloons and streamers fell onto the dancefloor.

'Happy New Year,' she turned and greeted Ewan but wasn't heard over the roar and applause of the crowd. She watched as people grabbed each other in random clinches as the sound of bells were played.

Rae turned to Ewan and she wasn't sure who moved the wrong way first, but as she went in towards him to give him a peck on the cheek she missed it and their lips met instead. His lips were on hers and it took her a few beats to realise what was happening. If things had been different she might have given into it and kissed him back more ease. He's was a good bloke and she knew she deserved good. It could be great and fun if it had happened another time. Instead what filled her head was the very person she had hoped to blot out. She could almost see Finn under the strobing lights, his skin flushed from the dance and that smile reserved only for her. He was all she could see, all golden brown hair and bottomless brown eyes. She pulled out of the kiss.

'Hap-Happy New Year!' Ewan looked just as taken aback as she was.

'Happy New Year Finn-Fuck-Ewan… Happy New Year Ewan.' Rae excused herself to the bathroom. The wait let her gather her thoughts and pull herself together. By the time she got back Ewan was waiting for her on the edge of the dancefloor which had by then cleared enough for her to spot him easily.

Chris waited for them as they got back to the booth and gave Ewan a tap in the back and turned to give Rae a kiss on the cheek that she made sure met the mark. Once she got seated she settled down she drank the last of her Snakebites and lined up a row of shots that she knocked back in quick succession. Rae wasn't completely sure what they were but they tasted of death as they burned the back of her throat. Ewan left for a while and when he came back he had his arm around a visibly drunk Sam.

'No, the bells haven't even gone yet.'

'Sam, it's already Next Year. You missed it.' Ewan looked at the others and shook his head at her.

'Oh Bollocks. Can we stay for a few more? It's just getting started.' She turned to go back to the dancefloor but nearly fell when Ewan just about caught hold of her again.

'Let's get you home you Muppet.'

The taxi ride back was expensive, not including the tip to the driver for having to go work on what was now technically New Year's Day. Chris was dropped off first and said his goodbyes from the window. The ride back home after that was quiet with a sleeping Sam sat between them in the back seat of the taxi.

Rae struggled to find her keys in her clutch bag to open the door while Ewan carried Sam in his arms. She stirred as they spoke and he put her down while she ran to the bushes and didn't come out for a few minutes when Ewan told Rae to head up to the flat and they'd catch up.

Rae dumped her keys in the bowl in the hall and turned on the lights as Ewan struggled in with Sam in his arms again.

'She ok?'

'Yeah. She's fine,' Ewan looked up at her from when he had Sam in a near fireman's lift and crossed from the doorway. He crouched with Sam in his arms and put her down on the couch. 'Bit sick back outside and then it was like she just switched off. Like lugging a shop mannequin.'

Rae looked to him feeling nauseated and heavy herself. She looked over at Sam and heard her half snoring and murmuring words she couldn't make out and the ones she did were gibberish. She pulled the blanket off from the back of the couch and draped it over where Ewan had sat her on the couch. She filled a glass of water and laid out some paracetamol for her to find in the morning on the coffee table and went to leave her to it for the night.

Ewan had slipped out for a change of shirt and came back in to check on the pair of them.

'She wasn't as bad till we lost her when she went off for a bit with those girls from class. I did try looking for her, so she can't blame me for the hangover tomorrow morning.' Rae rolled her eyes again then regretted it as the room spun.

'I'm not much better.' She felt her stomach lurch and put her hand to her mouth to stop it, _no vomitorium_.

'Think I'm gonna be sick.' She just about got to the sink in time.

'Shit.' She wiped at her mouth with a bit of kitchen towel and scrunched her face in disgust. 'Sorry.' She was mortified.

'It's ok,' he soothed her with a laugh. 'That one' he gestured to Sam, 'managed to spew all over my shirt downstairs and called me a wan-' he stopped mid-sentence and his face reddened.

'We've all got twatted on a bit of bucks fizz and woken up like a Silverback gorilla's been using your head as a football. We've all done it.' He nudged her to get her attention. 'I've seen worse, been a lot worse. I feel a bit worse,' he mused with a dry laugh. 'Woke up wearing a tutu and bra at one point. Good night that.' Rae sat down next to Sam where she had slumped to the arm of the couch. Ewan sat himself down on the other arm of the couch, unsure what to do. He moved his arm towards Rae's back then hesitated and leaned himself back against the sofa cushions. She felt the air between them shift and slid herself further away on the couch, got up and pulled Sam's legs up where she'd been sitting so she was lying down. She didn't want to meet Ewan's eyes and looked to the clock behind them instead.

'Oh shit,' she blurted. 'Is it after four? Sorry. I'm keeping you up, you look as bad as I feel.' Rae stiffened.'You should get some sleep. Cheers for looking after us both,' she offered him a weak smile with tired eyes.

'It's fine. Couldn't leave you alone in here if you're puking up everywhere like a scene from The Exorcist. I'm not waking up to that all over the walls in the morning.' Rae blanched at his rubbish joke and then saw the sly grin he shot her and she appreciated the gesture. 'You feeling any better?'

'Yeah, I think that was it. Think the sink took the most of it.' They were silent again for a moment.

'Look, about what happened at the club. No pressure, that wasn't on purpose. Don't regret it, but I didn't plan it.'

'Ewan,' Rae started. He really was a good bloke. Even with her mascara in rings around her eyes like Siobhan Fahey he still looked at her as normal.

'No, it's fine. Chalk it up to too much booze and bad dancing.' He shoved her shoulder and it felt a little lighter between them again, much to her relief.

'Thanks.I didn't ever want things to get weird with us. I'd have hated that.'

'No chance. Right,' he shifted himself back up to look at her. 'You should probably head off too. You'll not be much use to anybody if you're still a zombie tomorrow.'

'Yeah, might be a good idea.' She took her shoes off and padded towards the door. 'We still on for the dry run tomorrow?'

'Yeah, thought it could just sort some tracks back to back. Let's us head home a bit earlier.'

'Deal. 'Night.'

'Night,' she just heard him say it as he padded down the hall to her room before she closed the door over quietly and she was left alone to her thoughts.

That was a bad idea.

She dreamed of raves and nights out surrounded with the gang that she couldn't shake, even when she woke up for a glass of water. She dreamed of his lips finding hers in the club instead of Ewan's. Taking him by the hand and leading him back to her room and writing out all the words she couldn't say on his skin, letting them sink in like a spell, making sure he knew everything she felt but never said.

She wanted to tell him to stay, back on that bench. As selfish as it would have been she wanted him to stay in Stamford. At least in the country. She wanted to tell him all the things she used to think about when he was asleep beside her. She needed to tell him, but there was no chance of that now.

She hated the fact that she couldn't have said any of it ages ago. Even back in his room all that time ago with the same early light pooling around her now as it had been then. Annoyed at herself that her timing was so monumentally awful. That she was potentially being selfish and dragging things up all over again. It would help nobody, and yet it needed to be said. Alcohol talking or not.

Rae opened the door out to get some more water when she saw the phone at the end of the hall. She sat in the hallway beside it till she could see the pale blue light of the early morning stream in through the window behind her change to white and seep out down through the hall.

She wasn't even sure if the number would even be the same, that she might end up phoning some random wondering who the bloody hell was calling them in the early hours of the morning like a bunnyboiler. The receiver was in her hand for some time while she tried to talk herself out of it. Selfishness won out and she punched in the numbers. The phone rang out and she considered hanging up before she made an even bigger fool of herself. She didn't get the chance as something clicked and she braced herself for whoever was on the other end. Her breath felt tight and she considered cutting her loses with just looking like a weirdo and hanging up again when she heard a noise on the other end.

 _Oh bollocks_ , the machine clicked on and started its automated 'Sorry this number is not currently available to take your call, please leave a message at the sound of the tone,' followed by a bleat. It took her a moment to find her voice and what did come out sounded hoarse at first, her throat feeling tight still.

'I'm saying this because it's late and it's New Year and I've drank half a club dry. Because I know you're probably in the arse end of nowhere doing whatever it is you're doing to get this; but I did think about it… About you an' me. I did. I just didn't think I was enough, an' I am. I was always just waiting for it all to stop because I always thought it would all the time and that would've just been-' she ran a hand through her hair. This was a bad idea but she couldn't stop speaking when the machine let out a warning tone that she was running out of time.

'Right, so that's the machine beeping. That was it. I did, I really did, still do, and I don't want you to ever think that I didn't. Wanted to tell ya' on that bench I meant what I said. I meant everything I said. I just want you to be happy, whatever you're doing.' _Get To the point_ she yelled at herself internally '-You know what, ignore this. I'm talking crap- Just-good luck with everything. That was it.'

She put the button down to hang up and cradled the receiver to her chest, wondering how much she was going to regret this in the morning. If she hadn't said it then it would have burst out of her some other way, at least she hadn't said it to an actual voice. He probably wouldn't even get it. He'd probably changed his number and moved a dozen times over for all she knew. If she thought it would finally let her sleep she was only half right.


	12. Chapter 12

_Dear Diary,_

 _I need somebody to remind me to never mix drinks. My head has been thumping like there's a washing machine spinning with a concrete block in it. Can you have a week long hangover? The flashbacks didn't pop up from the night before till it's quiet. When I'm in the shower or waiting in the queue and I get hit with them in hideous movie style clips. I am NEVER drinking again. Famous last words._

 _Managed to humiliate myself twice in a single evening. Still hasn't beat my record. I did a stupid thing and I have to live with it._

 _On the plus side, didn't wake up in a field._

 _Not much else to say. I go to class, come home or head to the studio most weeks. I am starting at the Radio Station this Saturday though. Not sure what they want me to do. Probably getting coffee and calls or something. A Jarvis Cocker meeting wouldn't go amiss if the universe wanted to do me a favour though._

It was just over two months into the New Year and Rae had largely put everything from that night behind her to focus on the classes and work leading to her exams at the end of May. Things fell back into their usual routine again and she had been about to make her way to the library to get some last minute reading done before her shift began at Amped. She searched for where she last threw her keys down in the early morning silence before everybody woke up. She tried to stay quiet so she wouldn't wake the whole flat up but let out a yelp at the figure on the couch in the dark.

* * *

'Morning.' Rae hadn't even seen Sam sitting on the couch. She was propped up like some kind of demented ventriloquist dummy from the recess of her nightmares.

'Jesus,' Rae turned on the spot and her hand flew to the strap of her bag.

'Sorry, look like the Crypt Keeper here I know.' Sam dropped her head back on the couch. 'You alright?' She drawled, the welsh of her accent noticeably thick with exhaustion.

'You're asking me?'

'Shut up, I'm not that bad. This isn't a hangover. It'd be worth it if it was a hangover. Some shitty twenty-four hour bug. I'm going out tonight if it kills me though, sod it.' Sam shifted in her seat and pulled the bucket and towel closer to her on the couch 'You. Me. Portishead gig next month.'

'Erm, can we maybe swap it for something less hectic?'

'Come on. I promise it'll be strictly coke on the rocks from here on out.' The word coke made her face turn green.

'I'll think about it. D'you need anything?'

'Shit ton of that Lucozade would be grand.' Sam pointed behind her to the kitchen and Rae moved back to the fridge and passed her the bottle. Sam gave her a half-hearted thumbs up after she took it. Rae fished her keys out from under the hall table, gave Sam a sympathetic smile and a wave, collected her bag and turned to head out.

'Hold on, Rae.' Sam called her back from her spot on the couch. 'I forgot. Somebody rang for you.'

Rae twisted round where she stood, heart in her stomach.

'Said you were to give her a call soon as. Clover I think she said.' Rae let out the breath she'd been holding and peeked back into the room.

'Cheers Sam.'

Rae got to the phone and sat on the hallway floor while she waited for Chloe to pick up, hoping whatever it was wasn't anything too bad. The receiver picked up on the other end and Rae spoke before she even got a hello.

'Chloe, you ok?'

'Rae, I'm really glad I caught you.' Her voice was the opposite of what she expected, she sounded excited and Rae's breathing slowed again.

'What's up?'

'You know how Izzy's show had some people from places outside of town and that?' Chloe's words tumbled out without a pause, 'you know from designers, businesses, that kind of thing?' Rae nodded silently before she realised what she was doing, 'Rae.'

'Yeah, sorry. Sort of. Why?'

'Well, back when I was helping Izzy out backstage we were sorting through all the outfits she made; getting the glue off and getting things sorted when this woman came up to me. She overheard us talking and she said how she liked that I kept everybody calm in all the stress. That I had a good eye for things and that kind of thing, can't remember.'

'Right.' Rae wasn't sure what she was trying to say but listened patiently.

'I had this interview yesterday and she's asked me if I wanted to be an apprentice for her firm. She sorts out photo shoots and events. Just got off the phone with her before I rang you to tell me I got it. It's a job Rae. I've got a sodding job. It'd mean answering phones and all that, but she says I can work up to becoming an events organiser. I'd get to pick who to hire and places to book for weddings and shows. She knows I'm doing all this business course so if I can get that last year out of the way it's mine.'

'That's amazing Chloe.' Rae smiled down at the phone with pride as if she could see her on the other end.

'I know, I'm excited and everything I just…' She trailed off with a nervy voice. Rae waited a beat for her to finish. 'I'm a bit worried, it's about an hour away. I'd have to move, maybe. I'm not like you Rae. I've never been that far away from them, from my dad.' She paused again and Rae waited for her to get it all out, 'what if it all goes wrong and I'm stuck on my own?'

'Chloe, it's an hour away not a plane trip. That's nothing.' Rae reasoned. 'You won't be on your own anyway, you've got me. You'll meet people. That's what happens. You go somewhere new and you meet all these brilliant people you never thought and you start a life. It's okay, you'll be okay.'

'I know, you're right. I'm over thinking it. I'm excited. I really am, just nervous. This is massive Rae.' Chloe changed the subject and her tone brightened all over again. 'The girls are taking me out tonight but you and me need to do something later on when you're not as snowed under with stuff. Speaking of excited, when's your radio job?'

'I know, it's huge. I'll have to come back down to see you. It's today, well, six. They won't want me to do much. It's not a big deal,' Rae calmed herself. 'Think I'll be sat at a desk for ages so I can get stuff done between breaks.'

'Good luck babe, phone me next week and we'll sort something out. We'll talk properly then.'

They said their goodbyes and Rae hung up. She got to the library in just enough time to get in a few hour's study before she had to leave for the evening.

When she got there that evening they wanted her to do just about everything. On the first shift she had a few weeks before she managed to get lost on the way there. The Amped Radio building was a job in itself to find. Rae had passed it several times where it stood hidden under a cluster of large trees, tucked in the corner of an industrial estate. Despite being ten minutes late it hadn't gone noticed considering the already hectic environment. Her first week from then was spent shadowing one of the runners and involved mostly, hence the title, running errands and making sure everything ran on time for the live shows. It was exhausting work but she was happy to be there, surrounded by music and learning as she went along.

That particular week the station had been organising their own 'up and coming' sessions that month and the whole building had become chaotic with the frantic dash to get everything planned in time. The station had been setting up a live band to play in the evenings each week, mostly smaller bands she hadn't heard of yet, giving them a chance to play a set and the potential to be signed. Mark, or 'Marky Moon' when he was on air, her line manager of sorts was the evening presenter for the event and he hadn't been able to mentor her as much as he'd have liked and had offered to make it up to her at a later date. The two of them were sat in the front rooms where they hosted one to one interviews and the occasional paperwork the admin team requested. Her shift had technically finished an hour ago but she had agreed to stay behind to help out for a short while. Maybe if she showed she was willing to put in the work they'd think about keeping her on full-time. She could dream.

'Can you make sure Hannah in room nine gets the rights to play these? Management's up my arse again over it.' Mark leaned over her at her desk and passed her some papers and a list to work through to help him with get some last minute planning done an hour before he went live.

'Yeah, I can do that soon as I'm finished with these,' she held up the last stack of paper he gave her to sort through.

'That's the kind of thing I like to hear.' He gave her a thumbs up and made his way towards the double doors before halting and doubling back towards her desk. 'Nearly forgot. The album signing is this Wednesday coming. I want you to get some vox pops from the fans, have a bit of fun with it and we'll see what you've got.'

Ignoring the fact that he hadn't mentioned which, band, album or which signing it was for her stomach sunk. Wednesday was the one day classes finished late; an hour before the shops closed. The chances of finishing her last tutorial and getting down to the record shop on time were almost non-existent. A moment of panic passed and she considered how to word that she wouldn't be able to do it; but how many opportunities was she going to get to actually show she was capable of actual presenting work? She could find people down in the Student Bar and they wouldn't be any the wiser.

'I can do that, definitely.'

'That's a girl.' That one earned her the honour of a double thumbs up that she returned with a nervous smile.

There was a commotion through in reception about an hour past the time she was supposed to have been home. Shadows passed over her from the corner of her eye who she assumed was the band making their entrance. The PR crew dashed to sort them into the recording room or wherever it was they were supposed to be. Rae heard someone stop to the side of where her and Mark sat at the front desk. Rae had been busy taking her pen through Mark's notes and checking things off to look when Mark greeted the guest for her.

'The studio's through there mate. I'll show you what everything does and you can get everything sorted no bother.' Whoever it was had hesitated, she sensed them hovering near her desk, feet shifting from side to side from the sound of it. Mark left her to it and slid out to help their guest.

'Just here,' she looked up briefly to see him gesture at the doors beside him and back down again to focus on her work. 'I'm Mark, I'll be presenting tonight so any sound stuff you can run by me. The equipment's all through here. Let the girl back at that desk know if you need anything and she can head round for beers or coffee, whatever your lot need.' Rae heard him trail off his speech and open out the door to the room around the corner. Rae didn't think much of it and threw herself into her paperwork. Everything was more or less done by the time she settled in for the hour and there was just one paper left to slot into the out pile. A short time later the call waiting light blinked on the phone on her desk. "The blue light of dread" as the rest of the building talked about it. The internal caller button. They only ever did that when you were about to be fired she'd heard or to be screeched at for whatever misfortune whichever poor soul had made. Rae took a breath to steady her nerves and pushed the button.

'Rae speaking, how can I help?'

Mark answered, not angry just his usual laid back tone. 'Rae, can I see you for a minute in room two?'

She got up from the desk and grabbed her notepad. Hoping she wasn't about to be shouted at. That whatever it was would be something simple like a coffee run. She turned the corner and moved towards room two with trepidation. _Please don't give me the sack, please don't give me the sack. Please don't give me the chuffing sack._

A hand caught hers when she had it on the door handle. Hannah stood in the corridor beside her and stopped for a moment to catch her breath. 'Did Mark sign off those forms yet? I needed them an hour ago.'

'Yeah, yeah they're on my desk beside the red stapler.' Rae gestured back to the desk.

'Tah,' Hannah didn't turn around as she thanked her and sped walked in her heels towards Rae's desk. Rae opened the door to room two.

'Sorry, sorry. Got held up, hi,' Rae apologised feeling flustered for keeping them waiting. Mark stood in the doorway, patted her on the back and turned back to the guest, his broad frame blocking her view from the door.

'This is Rachel. She's our intern. Rachel this is the soundman for the live gig he's got a few questions that need clearing up.' Mark introduced him to her without Rae even seeing him. 'She'll get your lot sorted for anything you need and any questions. I'll be in my office for any emergencies. Feel free to go soon as your done here Rae.' He ushered her inside and shut the door over. Her stomach dropped as she looked into the room properly.

Either she was having one of her usual daydreams or he was standing three paces from her. He had been crouched beside an amp with a loop of cables in his hand. He unplugged it and wound the cable around at the back, leaving it ready to be wheeled out on the trolley to his right. He took a load of blue and black wires and tied them secure together with blue tape and straightened his back to face her, looking unsure of himself. In her daydreams he had always been smiling.

'Finn,' His name came out hoarse in her throat. 'What are you doing? What-when did you get back? How-how long have you been here? How?-What?' All of her thoughts were jumbled mess as she stared at him.

'Just got back from the arse end of nowhere,' he answered. She couldn't read him with his face cast towards the ground and felt her throat tighten. _Oh bollocks._

'Oh shit,' Rae started, she couldn't look at him. 'I'm so sorry Finn. I don't even know why I did it. I was just,' she searched for the wording but had nothing. 'I was being a twat and I didn't think you'd-'

'Rae, Rae, listen.' He crossed the room towards her and put his hands on her arms. 'I'm glad you rang. Rae.' He moved his head so she had to look at him. 'I'm glad I just don't want-.'

'When-when did you even get back?' She caught her breath, 'thought you'd be in Denmark or somewhere by now. How did you know I was here?'

'I didn't. I saw you at the desk just now, didn't know what I'd have done if you'd seen me.' He looked at her again and she focused on the curls of his fringe to avoid his eyes, not trusting herself. 'We got as far as Brussels when that lot,' he gestured to the both across from them where the band were finishing off tuning up. 'Got into this massive row and it all kicked off. Nearly ran out of money at Calais. None of us knew any French. Ended up close to hitch-hiking just to get back across the channel.'

'Jesus,' she whispered, 'Seriously?' He nodded at her then looked back down.

'Got home with just enough money to get back to Dover and played a few gigs for the money to get back. Got the flyer for this thing down there. We headed back home for a bit and headed up here the other night.' Rae listened with her heart in her throat, not having a clue what to think or how to feel. Refusing to allow herself to hope.

'I didn't even get back home to the flat till a week ago when I heard what you said.'

'Finn,' she started, ready for the inevitable conversation. How it was a bad idea; that he'd moved on, that she should too. He sat down on one of the chairs and she braced herself for it.

'Wanted to say as much ages ago.' His words took a while to sink in and when they did she darted her head over to look at him. His elbows were leaning on his knees where he sat at the soundboards and looked down at the ground. 'Would've been a dick if I had. You were really happy Rae. I was so happy for you. You had this job and Uni. Had it all sorted out and I wasn't going to be that knobhead that holds you back. I wanted to. If I'd have thought you felt like that for a second I could've-' he shook the thought away. 'I wasn't going to wreck things for you.'

'I should have said all of it ages ago,' the words were out before she had time to think it through. 'Things would've been different if I did. I meant what I said Finn. I might not have said it how you deserved to hear it, but I meant it.'

'Think we're both a bit shit at it, at this,' he struggled the right words.

'Talking?' The word hung between them ironically till Finn stood up and crossed back over to her.

'Yeah.'

'So, what now?'

'Well _now_ I'm stuck in Bristol till pay day at a crap Bed and Breakfast till I sort out what I'm doing.' For a moment she wondered if he'd understood what she meant when he looked at her with a knowing smile. 'Could use somebody to show me about.' The offer went over her head for a beat till she realised what he was asking and her pulse sped.

'We could head back to mine,'

'Steady on girl,' he raised his eyebrows and gave her a scandalised look, the glint in his eyes betraying him.

'Not what I meant.' He raised his eyebrows at her again and she suppressed giving in and letting him see her so heated. 'We could head back to mine to talk. I want to, need to talk. My flatmates will be out.' He kept looking at her, a sly smile escaping the corner of his mouth. Eyes darting over her face. 'Shut up,'

'Thought you wanted to do the opposite.' His smile was crooked, one reserved just for her. One she'd seen so many times in her mind since they'd parted ways. That broke the wall she'd been trying to build and she let herself laugh, feeling lighter just being around him again.

'What did you need answering, from when you called me in?'

'Nothing, made it up, but he doesn't know that. Just wanted to see you,' he admitted, 'I wasn't thinking about anything past this.' He looked at her and she saw his eyes darken till the lights above them shone in fragments. Till she couldn't tell where his pupils ended.

The atmosphere shifted around them and she wasn't sure who moved first, but she felt him wrap his arm around her waist where they stood together and their lips met almost instinctively. She pulled him closer to her by his shirt and threaded her fingers through his and led him outside, not letting go.

The trip back to the flat was frustratingly long, especially being so close and not touching. Not daring to until they got to the privacy of the flat. As soon as the door unlocked their lips met and they tangled themselves up in each other, not wanting to part until they reached the other side of her bedroom door. Finn kicked it closed with a thump and Rae walked backwards to lead him to her bed. She fell back onto the covers and he positioned himself over her on the bed. Rae pulled him down towards her and danced her hand along the waistband of his jeans. She heard his breath catch and kissed him softly at first, getting more heated as she met the need emanating from his touch.

Their hands roved over each other and Finn slowly began to unbutton her blouse, tortuously slowly till she shifted in the bed to help him glide the fabric from her arms. Her bra and the rest of her clothes followed soon after. Her fingers traced the familiar planes of his chest as she pulled off his shirt and pulled him back down to her. The heat of his skin on hers sent all other thoughts out of her mind. Rae struggled with his belt and laughed as the metal got stuck in one of the belt loops and he just got up and stripped them off with ease and smiled down at her warmly. He stripped himself down completely and reached down to his wallet and pulled out the square wrapper. She took it gently from his hands and tore it open, rolling it over his length slowly, not looking away from his gaze. He let out the breath he'd been holding in a silent moan and positioned himself between her and lifted her leg to hook it over the back of his thigh.

She poured everything into that moment with him. Both of them filled with want, making up for the time apart. She ran her hands down his back eliciting a groan against her mouth as their lips found each other. She pressed his lower back down to her and a small sound escaped her throat as they found their rhythm with ease. Every touch and whisper met with encouraging moves and sighs. Finn moved a hand down from his grip on her hips and trailed his fingers in feather light movements between her breasts. His fingers and mouth skirted over the sensitive skin and downwards till she felt a jolt ignite in her centre sending waves from the tip of her scalp to her toes. She cried out then and he laughed shakily, putting a hand to his still damp mouth with a smirk.

Rae ran an unsteady hand across his chest, lingering on his lower abdomen and moving them round to rake her fingers up his back. They moved together like no time had passed between them at all. She felt his body arch and they came apart together. Afterwards, in the quiet apart from the sound of their breaths she traced patterns onto his chest. She formed them into words like I love you, like I missed you, needed you, but they weren't enough. He needed to hear them, needed to come from her.

'This isn't talking,' she said once they'd settled into the covers again and their breathing had slowed. She didn't know where to start, but she tried. He just waited patiently and held as she found her voice again. 'I think things would have been different if we had. If we'd talked, if I'd talked to you. Told you all of it.'

'Maybe we just needed the space, bit of time away to think about it. About what we want.' His voice vibrated against her chest where she lay with his arm holding her close to him on his chest. He was right, maybe she needed time to sort out her feelings, start a life for herself to know what she needed.

'Six months, three hours and leaving the country. That's got to be some sort of record.' Rae let out a dry laugh and adjusted her head to listen to his heart beat under her. She heard it quicken and looked up at him as he spoke.

'We've got time to get better at it, at us.' Finn pushed the edge of the pillow out of the way to meet her eyes, like a silent question. He looked vulnerable under the warm glow of the lights above the bed. She didn't look away as she answered.

'We've got time,' she agreed, brushing her hand across his jaw and pulling him towards her again.

It was March two thousand and two when she got her evening slot at Amped. Working her way up although taking time had just given her more knowledge and experience at every level. It made her empathetic when it was her turn to train the interns. Gave her time to build up a great team behind her and she couldn't be more content with where she was in her life. It was a new feeling, one she never wanted to leave her.

Her promotion wasn't marked with any particular cause for celebration, but she knew that when she got back from her shift that night there'd be somebody heading back to her as she spoke into the mic. She could count the tracks in her mind until he would pass through the border. Long distance might have been romantic in theory, but in reality the weeks away were getting harder and harder the longer they were together. It was funny that she could have everything she wanted from someone, all of them, and it didn't dim any of the need for them. It just made her need him more, they could never be close enough. The sooner he started the concert hall job the better.

Rae pulled her headphones back on as the red light clicked on above her. 'Right, that was the Red Hot Chili Peppers with Dosed. Up next we've got Oasis and The Doves and I'll be taking your suggestions for the next hour, so, give us a call,' Rae rattled off the number off, 'and we'll be back right after this.'

She stepped away from the mic for a time as the adverts clicked on. She chatted with the sound team when her last calls for the evening slot rolled in. The red light flared back on and she was back on air. She pushed the button down on the first caller.

'Amped Radio. You're through to Rae. What can I do for you?' She was busy on autopilot as she spoke into the phone into the mic to notice the familiar voice.

'I was wondering if you're still takin' requests for "Live at Five."' His voice sounded odd, like someone trying to lower their voice. Something about it made her furrow her brows till she shook it off and continued.

'I am. Whose it for? And give me a track and I'll stick it on as soon as I can.'

'It's to congratulate May on her new job,' Finn dropped the voice with what she knew was a knowing smirk, 'and can you stick on a bit of Babylon Zoo, her favourite song.'

She could hear the sound of traffic in the background, he must have reached the service station an hour away from her. Rae looked over to her team behind the glass listening in and had to hide the grin spreading across her face. She cleared her throat to suppress her laughter and annoyance at his music choice and smiled into the mic.

'Coming right up.'

 _You cheeky bastard._


End file.
